Should Americans be Buying Olive Oil Made in the U.S?: Part 2
In Part 1 of this series, I discussed how the demand for inexpensive olive oil in large quantities is causing environemental problems in some of the world’s largest olive oil producing countries including Italy, Spain, Greece and Portugal.
It’s estimated that 95% of the olive oil in the country comes form the Mediterranean region. For those of us in America who are trying to incorporate more local foods into our diet, this causes a problem. The U.S. isn’t known for it’s olive oil. At least, not yet. But it seems that many regions in California are stepping up their olive growing and their olive oil producing. According to a news brief on oliveoilsource.com
Olive oil is a rapidly growing industry in California, with volume projected to increase by 1000 percent in the next five years. California also produces 99.9% of the olive oil grown in the U.S.
and recently
Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed into law Senate Bill (SB) 634 to provide stronger support to domestic olive oil producers nationwide by giving further clarification and quality control over olive oil sold in the United States.
So it looks like there will be a lot more olive oil being produced in the U.S. and steps are being taken to ensure the quality of that oil. In fact, the article says that
the new law finally gives regulatory weight to how olive oil is labeled and marketed and substance to quality control issues that have plagued the industry involving lower-grade oils fraudulently marketed as extra virgin.
