Croatian Island of Korcula Gets a PDO

Olive oil from the Croatian island of Korčula has been added to the European Commission’s list of Protected Designations of Origin (PDO).

The appli­ca­tion was approved yes­ter­day under the appel­la­tion ​“Korčulansko masli­novo ulje” (Korčulan olive oil), pub­lished in the European Union’s Official Journal, and entered into the EU reg­is­ter of prod­ucts with the des­ig­na­tion of PDO.
See Also:The best olive oils from Croatia
The island of Korčula has close to 1,000 olive farms and ten olive mills, with olive oil pro­duc­tion being an impor­tant local eco­nomic activ­ity.

Olive oil is pro­duced here with two indige­nous cul­ti­vars: Lastovka and Drobnica, which make up 80 per­cent of the total pro­duc­tion, with 20 per­cent from other cul­ti­vars grown in the area. All stages of pro­duc­tion, includ­ing cul­ti­va­tion, har­vest and pro­cess­ing of the olives, as well as stor­age and bot­tling of the olive oil, take place on the island.

For this rea­son, olive oil from Korčula qual­i­fies for PDO sta­tus, the high­est recog­ni­tion of a qual­ity prod­uct of the three exist­ing EU schemes – the two oth­ers being PGI (Protected Geographical Indication) and TSG (Traditional Speciality Guaranteed). The scheme pro­tects prod­uct names from mis­use and helps con­sumers deter­mine the authen­tic­ity of a prod­uct.

According to the spe­cific EU rules con­cern­ing labelling, the prod­uct label must dis­play the com­mon iden­ti­fier, i.e. the offi­cial logo that has been designed for Korčula olive oil, and the year of har­vest. Also, olive oil mar­keted as ​“Korčulansko masli­novo ulje” must have physico-chem­i­cal and organolep­tic prop­er­ties in line with inter­na­tional stan­dards.

Two other Croatian olive oils have already been granted PDO sta­tus by the EU: extra vir­gin olive oil from the island of Cres, and olive oil from Krk; while olive oils from the region of Istria and Šolta island still await this appel­la­tion.

• Official Journal of the European Union


• Official Journal of the European Union