Posted By Dr. Michael Polsinelli, DC On May 7, 2013 @ 8:18 pm In Food,Health,Nutrition | No Comments

We think that olive oil as being healthy for you. Unfortunately the olive oil industry is corrupt and poor quality oil is being sold as extra virgin. With the announcement that Thorne had trouble sourcing quality olive oil ^[1], I decided to post these articles on olive oil. I had printed it for the one for the office, but forgot to link it here so here they are:

SLIPPERY BUSINESS

The trade in adulterated olive oil.

BY TOM MUELLER

On August 10, 1991, a rusty tanker called the Mazal II docked at the industrial port of Ordu, in Turkey, and pumped twenty-two hundred tons of hazelnut oil into its hold. The ship then embarked on a meandering voyage through the Mediterranean and the North Sea. By September 21st, when the Mazal II reached Barletta, a port in Puglia, in southern Italy, its cargo had become, on the ship’s official documents, Greek olive oil. It slipped through customs, possibly with the connivance of an official, was piped into tanker trucks, and was delivered to the refinery of Riolio, an Italian olive-oil producer based in Barletta. There it was sold—in some instances blended with real olive oil—to Riolio customers. Full Article ^[2]

OLIVE OIL’S DARK SIDE

POSTED BY SALLY ERRICO ^[3]

In the August 13, 2007, issue of the magazine, Tom Mueller wrote about corruption in the olive-oil trade ^[2]. By the late nineteen-nineties, olive oil—often cut with cheaper oils, such as hazelnut and sunflower seed—was the most adulterated agricultural product in the European Union. The E.U.’s anti-fraud office established an olive-oil task force, “yet fraud remains a major international problem,” Mueller wrote. “Olive oil is far more valuable than most other vegetable oils, but it is costly and time-consuming to produce—and surprisingly easy to doctor.”

Nearly five years later, fraud remains a problem. Mueller has expanded the scope of his article’s research with his recent book “Extra Virginity: The Sublime and Scandalous World of Olive Oil ^[4],” which focusses on the contamination of olive oil not only by seed oils but by the misuse of the label “extra virgin” on olive oils that don’t meet that designation’s standards. Mueller recently took the time to answer questions on olive oil and the risks involved in its trade; an edited version of the exchange appears below. Full Article ^[5]

SLIPPERY BUSINESS

The trade in adulterated olive oil.

BY TOM MUELLER

OLIVE OIL’S DARK SIDE

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