USDA Olive Oil Standards Take Effect Today
As of today, October 25, the United States has modern federal grade standards for olive oil and olive-pomace oil, replacing a 1948 standard that graded oil from “Grade A” down to “Substandard” without ever defining extra virgin. The new U.S. standards follow the International Olive Council closely, with two deliberate differences, and they are voluntary. Here is what changes today, what does not, and what it means for anyone buying oil in America.
What happened
The Agricultural Marketing Service of the U.S. Department of Agriculture published the revised United States Standards for Grades of Olive Oil and Olive-Pomace Oil in the Federal Register on April 28, with an effective date of October 25, 2010. The revision replaces the first edition, in force since March 22, 1948, which used the labels U.S. Grade A or U.S. Fancy through to U.S. Grade D or Substandard. Those terms meant nothing to anyone in the modern olive oil trade.
The change started with a petition from the California Olive Oil Council, whose members argued that because there was no U.S. definition of olive oil, unscrupulous blenders could turn out low-quality olive oil or olive-pomace oil and sell it as extra virgin at a premium price. The USDA published a proposal in June 2008 and received comments from 26 parties, including producers, consumers, trade associations and government agencies in the United States, Australia, Argentina, New Zealand, Portugal, Spain and Tunisia.
What the standards say
The new standards define the grades the market actually uses: extra virgin, virgin, a lampante grade that is not fit to eat without refining, refined olive oil, olive oil (a blend of refined and virgin), and the olive-pomace oils. Olive-pomace oil may not be labeled as olive oil. Blends with herbs, spices, fruit or other oils fall outside the standards altogether. To earn the extra virgin grade an oil must have a free acidity of no more than 0.8 percent, no sensory defects and some fruitiness, as under the IOC rules.
There are 22 tests in all, from free acidity, peroxide value and ultraviolet absorbance to fatty acid and sterol composition. On two of them the USDA deliberately departs from the IOC:
| Parameter | IOC limit | New U.S. limit |
|---|---|---|
| Linolenic acid | 1.0 percent | 1.5 percent, with extra tests between 1.0 and 1.5 |
| Campesterol | 4.0 percent | 4.5 percent, with extra tests between 4.0 and 4.5 |
The reason is that the IOC limits were set on data from the Mediterranean, and producers in Australia, Argentina, Israel, New Zealand and elsewhere pointed out that some of their genuine oils naturally run a little higher. The USDA estimates that only about 1 percent of American production would fall above the IOC limits, but it chose to accommodate it. Our explainers on sterols and on the fatty-acid profile show why these two numbers are used to catch seed oils in the first place.
Voluntary, and why it still matters
Nobody is obliged to use the new grades. A producer or importer who wants a USDA grade asks for an inspection, and samples go to the agency’s laboratory in Blakely, Georgia, for chemical analysis and tasting by a panel trained by IOC-qualified instructors. The California council, which filed its petition five years ago, calls the standards a terrific first step but says it would like to see enforcement at some point.
Even without enforcement, the standards give state and federal agencies a legal definition to act on when oil is mislabeled. That matters more this year than it would have last. In July the UC Davis Olive Center reported that most imported extra virgin samples it bought in California failed the sensory standards, and in August a group of chefs sued several major brands and retailers over it. Anyone arguing in court about what extra virgin means now has a federal text to point at.
- For shoppers: nothing on the shelf changes today.
- For honest producers: a common language with buyers, backed by Washington.
- For regulators: a reference, as California already has under its own state olive oil law.
A grade standard only bites when somebody tests. Most imported oil will never be submitted for a USDA grade, which does not mean it would fail, only that nobody paid for the certificate. The real shift is legal: “extra virgin” on an American label is no longer a word without a definition, and every importer’s lawyer knows it.