Spain Announces Expanded Anti-Fraud Controls for Olive Oil Sector

Summary

New offi­cial con­trols and anti-fraud checks will be imple­mented in Spain’s olive oil and pomace prod­ucts chain, with most mea­sures tak­ing effect in 2026, aim­ing to reas­sure con­sumers and safe­guard the rep­u­ta­tion of the agri­cul­tural prod­uct. The Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Fisheries announced the mea­sures fol­low­ing con­cerns over fraud in the olive oil mar­ket, with inspec­tions extend­ing across the entire sup­ply chain and a focus on iden­ti­fy­ing crit­i­cal risk points to com­bat mis­rep­re­sen­ta­tion and fraud.

Starting this year, new offi­cial con­trols and anti-fraud checks will be rolled out across Spain’s entire olive oil and pomace prod­ucts chain, with most mea­sures tak­ing effect in 2026.

The ini­tia­tive aims to reas­sure domes­tic and inter­na­tional con­sumers, curb fraud and safe­guard the rep­u­ta­tion of Spain’s flag­ship agri­cul­tural prod­uct.

The new mea­sures were announced by the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Fisheries (MAPA), fol­low­ing a broad pro­posal pre­sented to the gov­ern­ment by the Spanish olive oil sec­tor in recent months.

The announce­ment also fol­lows an intense national debate over alleged shadow oper­a­tions in the olive oil mar­ket, trig­gered by accu­sa­tions raised in December 2024 by Dcoop, a coop­er­a­tive rep­re­sent­ing thou­sands of grow­ers. That debate was fur­ther ampli­fied by per­sis­tent trace­abil­ity con­cerns across the sec­tor.

Under the new frame­work, at least 20 per­cent of olive oil oper­a­tors will be sub­ject to offi­cial qual­ity con­trols each year, con­firm­ing and rein­forc­ing exist­ing inspec­tion thresh­olds.

While spe­cific checks will focus on olive oil pro­duc­ers, inspec­tions will extend across the entire sup­ply chain, includ­ing mar­ket­ing ser­vices, retail­ers and bor­der con­trols.

One of the core objec­tives of the plan is to iden­tify crit­i­cal risk points in pro­duc­tion and mar­ket­ing where mis­rep­re­sen­ta­tion, non-com­pli­ance or fraud is more likely to occur.

The ini­tia­tive aligns with Spain’s National Control Plan for the Food Chain, which for­mally runs from 2026 to 2030 and oper­ates within the broader European Union frame­work for food con­trols.

The plan also builds on an updated ver­sion of the Special Guide to Combat Fraud, devel­oped in 2023 by MAPA and the Food Quality Coordination Board. The guide sup­ports pub­lic author­i­ties in coor­di­nat­ing inspec­tions, with a stronger empha­sis on risk analy­sis rather than rou­tine checks.

Data-dri­ven con­trols will be sup­ported by the ministry’s dig­i­tal trace­abil­ity tools, SIMO and REMOA.

SIMO, Spain’s olive oil mar­ket infor­ma­tion sys­tem, col­lects pro­duc­tion, stock and out­put data from oper­a­tors to mon­i­tor mar­ket bal­ance and flag anom­alies. REMOA, the manda­tory bulk move­ment reg­is­ter, tracks trans­fers of olive oil and pomace oil to ensure phys­i­cal trace­abil­ity and sup­port tar­geted anti-fraud con­trols at the national level.

To fur­ther strengthen enforce­ment, the plan also pro­vides tech­ni­cal work­shops for regional inspec­tion ser­vices.

These ses­sions will be coor­di­nated by the Agency for Information and Control on Agrifood (AICA) to ensure con­sis­tent and har­mo­nized appli­ca­tion of the new con­trol frame­work across Spain.

One notable indus­try pro­posal that was not included in the MAPA plan con­cerns a vol­un­tary auto-con­trol frame­work pro­moted by the Interprofesional del Aceite de Oliva Español.

That pro­posal envi­sioned an indus­try-led sys­tem of proac­tive qual­ity and trans­parency con­trols, with oper­a­tors vol­un­tar­ily shar­ing detailed oper­a­tional data to com­ple­ment offi­cial inspec­tions. MAPA opted instead to rely exclu­sively on pub­lic con­trols and exist­ing state-man­aged data­bases, cit­ing con­cerns related to legal enforce­abil­ity, data gov­er­nance and uneven par­tic­i­pa­tion.

In a recent spe­cial report on olive oil con­trol sys­tems in Europe, the European Court of Auditors found Spain to be among the more advanced mem­ber states, while still fac­ing chal­lenges in fully imple­ment­ing E.U. reg­u­la­tions.

The audi­tors noted that despite Spain’s use of dig­i­tal tools and sec­tor-spe­cific reg­is­ters, min­i­mum stan­dards for con­for­mity checks are not always met, and ori­gin ver­i­fi­ca­tion remains uneven across regions.

The report empha­sized the need for risk-based inspec­tions, improved use of data and clearer method­olo­gies — areas the new MAPA plan is explic­itly designed to address.

According to MAPA, the mea­sures have already been endorsed by all autonomous com­mu­ni­ties, strength­en­ing their enforce­ment cred­i­bil­ity. Initial impacts are expected to emerge dur­ing the cur­rent olive oil sea­son.