Olive oil prices are rising across Europe (Picture: Getty/Europol)
Rising prices are everywhere – but the cost of one product is particularly crazy.
Olive oil, a product so revered it was nicknamed ‘liquid gold’ by the Ancient Greeks, has skyrocketed in price in recent months.
The cost of the cooking staple has risen by more than 110% in a year, according to some reports.
And now criminal gangs are cashing in.
A black market underworld of counterfeit and stolen olive oils is booming.
So, why is the price of olive oil on the rise, and why have gangs gotten involved?
Dizzying cost
The price of olive oil has steadily risen over the last few years, but in the last 12 months its rocketed.
According to analysis by Sky News, the average price of a 500ml bottle of olive oil has risen from £3.54 in January 2021 to £7.45 today, a rise of 110.5%.
Over in the EU, the price of olive rose by 50% in a year.
A graph from the Office for National Statistics shows rising olive oil prices over the last 10 years (Picture: ONS)
Portugal was the hardest hit, with olive oil prices rising by 69% between 2023 and 2024. Prices are up 67% in Greece and 63% in Spain.
The price hike is having a knock-on effect on olive oil consumption, with foodies turning to cheaper alternatives.
In the UK, consumption of olive oil fell by 14% in 2023 compared to the year before, while in Spain, olive oil sales fell by 40% in 2023.
Cashing in
Criminal gangs have been exploiting the olive oil market for decades.
In 2008, the Italian police even launched a special investigation named ‘Operation Golden Oil’ to crack down on corrupt olive oil sales in the country.
Last year Spanish and Italian law enforcement seize over 260 000 litres of inconsumable ‘extra virgin oil’in one operation (Picture: Europol)
But in recent years, criminals have turned to new methods to make their money.
Some fraudsters sell cheaper oils under the label of extra virgin olive oil to make a high markup.
Last year, a father and son were arrested by Greek police for selling sunflower oil as olive oil.
The pair allegedly dyed the sunflower oil to make their ruse more believable.
In November 2023, police in Spain and Italy teamed up to bust a counterfeit olive oil gang.
Police officers check warehouses for counterfeit activities (Picture: Europol)
They arrested 11 people in connection with the coverup and seized over 260,000 litres of olive oil unfit for consumption.
The police also seized €91,000 in cash.
The gang used low-quality lampante olive oil to dilute olive oil.
Lampante olive oil has an unpleasant odour, and isn’t usually consumed. It used to be used as lamp oil, which is where it gets its name.
In contrast, extra virgin olive oil is produced without any heat or chemicals. It’s the purest, and therefore most expensive, form of olive oil.
Lots of fake olive oil is sold to stores in the US. One 2010 study found that as much as 69% of imported European olive oil in the US wasn’t what it claimed to be.
The rising price of olive oil has also led to a wave of robberies and thefts as gangs try to cash in.
For instance, olive oil is the most stolen item in Spanish supermarkets.
In Greece and Italy, there have been several reports of gangs stealing olives and branches from farms.
Fake olive oil is big business (Picture: Europol)
Some even turned up with chainsaws to cut down the olive trees.
More than 100 olive trees were stolen or damaged in Greece in November, according to police reports.
In one robbery, a 150-year-old tree was cut down by thieves on the outskirts of Athens.
Neilos Papachristou, who runs an olive mill near Athens, told Euronews: ‘Not only do they steal our olives, but they cause the tree serious harm. It takes 4-5 years for it to return to normal.’
Some farmers have been forced to patrol their olive groves at night.
Why is olive oil so expensive?
Peculiar weather and bad harvests are mostly to blame for skyrocketing prices, Judy Ridgeway, author of The Olive Oil Diet, tells Metro.co.uk.
She says a heatwave and a drought in Spain in March and April 2023 had a devastating impact on olive farms, adding that this had far-reaching impact because Spain is the world’s largest olive oil producer.
Customers are swapping out olive oil for cheaper alternatives (Picture: TOLGA AKMEN/EPA-EFE/REX/Shutterstock)
‘If anything happens to the Spanish crop, then it’s going to affect the industry much more than if it happened somewhere else,’ Ridgeway says.
After the dry spring, things ‘went from bad to worse’ because of ‘unusual’ rainy spells in the summer, which affected the development of the olives.
According to Ridgeway, some Spanish farmers only made 30% or 40% of their usual output.
She says bad weather conditions in Greece also had an impact on olive oil supply.
‘Usually Greece is a very reliable supplier to fill in the gaps if you’ve got gaps elsewhere.’
In 2023, the Mediterranean experiences its hottest summer on record.
Researchers have called the Mediterranean, which produces much of the world’s olive supply, a climate change ‘hot spot’.
It’s warming 20% faster than the global average, which could have a knock-on effect on agriculture in the area. That, in turn, could lead to price rises.
Ridgeway also says that a bacterial disease has had an impact on Italian olive oil supplies.
A bacteria called Xylella Fastidiosa has ravaged olive trees in Italy in recent years, leaving them completely withered.
Other rising costs have had an effect, too.
‘In addition to that, last year, all sorts of other prices were going up as well. For example, the cost of glass bottles increased quite, quite substantially,’ Ridgeway says.
She says that while Brexit trade disruptions had an impact on olive oil prices a few years ago, she didn’t think that Brexit was contributing to the current price rise.