The Olive Oil Scandal

by Raymond Francis

There is a scandal in the olive oil industry, and if you use olive
oil, you
need to know about it. It=92s always advisable to substitute healthy
olive oil
in place of the toxic refined oils typically available in the
supermarket.
Here's the problem: not all olive oils are created equal. Only real
olive oil
will provide all the health-promoting benefits of olive oil, and
trying to
find real olive oil is like looking for a needle in a haystack.

Olive oil has been part of the human diet for more than 5,000 years.
Millennia
of human experience as well as modern research indicate that olive oil
is
beneficial to health, and can safely be included in our diet. In fact,
olive
oil has been singled out as a key contributor to the health of the
Greek
centenarians. To preserve the same health benefits that these Greeks
received,
modern oil must be produced in a manner that does not damage the oil's
nutrients.

Unfortunately, most commercial olive oil is processed in a manner that
damages
its nutritional content, and this is only the beginning of the
problems with
it. Most of the olive oil on the market today does not duplicate what
our
ancestors were eating, and frequently people are not getting what they
think
they are buying. Almost all olive oil is processed and diluted in ways
that
result in the loss of nutrients, which are essential to health. Olive
oil is
almost unique among the oils, in that it can be consumed in its crude
form
without refining. Not refining the oil has the benefit of conserving
the
vitamins, essential fatty acids, antioxidants, and other nutrients.
The
powerful antioxidants, in real extra virgin olive oil are beneficial
to health
and protect us from damage caused by free radical oxidation.

Cell membranes contain fatty acids that are highly susceptible to free
radical
damage. This damage produces lipid peroxides that can kill the cell.
Real
olive oil contains antioxidants (polyphenols, vitamin E, and other
natural
antioxidants) that prevent this type of damage.  Numerous studies show
that
olive oil reduces cholesterol, lowers blood pressure, inhibits
platelet
aggregation, and lowers the incidence of breast cancer. Because it is
so rich
in antioxidants, olive oil appears to dramatically reduce the
oxidation of LDL
cholesterol, thereby preventing heart disease. These same natural
antioxidants
also add to the stability, shelf life, and flavor of the oil.

Historically, high quality olive oil, rich in antioxidants, was easy
to
obtain, but not any more. Today, high quality oil is almost
unobtainable. One
has to seek out the small family-owned farms, where the oil is
literally
produced in ways similar to the Greeks and Romans. On these farms,
organic
olives are picked by hand so as to not damage the skin or pulp. They
are
transported in well-aerated containers and milled within 48 hours of
harvesting. Before milling, leaves and twigs are removed, the olives
are
washed, dried, and then crushed. The oil is separated from the olive
paste
without the use of heat, hot water, or solvents, and it is left
unfiltered, as
filtering also removes many nutrients. The first pressing produces the
best
extra virgin oil.

Producing olive oil the old way is more time consuming and expensive.
The
costs of harvesting by hand, to protect the fruit from damage, are
astronomical, but necessary to making good oil. The increasing demand
for
olive oil has moved production toward automation and mass production.
Modern
factories extract more oil more cheaply, but their processing methods
substantially reduce the nutritional quality of the oil.

To reduce costs, olives are machine harvested along with leaves and
twigs.
Olives that have dropped on the ground, are often mixed with the good
ones=
.
They are shipped in all kinds of containers, many of which are poorly
ventilated, and heaped in large piles. (Here, olives are stored for
too long
and often become moldy.) The oil is then extracted in a continuous
centrifuge
while hot water is used to help separate out the oil. Antioxidant
polyphenols
are soluble in water and are washed away in this process, thereby
lowering the
shelf life and the nutritional quality of the oil. Italy alone
produces
800,000 cubic meters of waste water per year from this process.
Because
substantial amounts of antioxidants are washed away, factory produced
olive
oil has a short shelf life of only months, whereas real olive oil
lasts for
two to three years.

Most people think that by purchasing extra virgin olive oil, they are
guaranteed of getting the best quality oil. Not so! Almost all the
"extra
virgin" olive oil on the market does not supply the nutritional value
and
healthful properties that we have a right to expect from olive oil. A
major
criterion for grading olive oil is its level of acidity. Extra virgin
oil
should have a free oleic acid acidity of no more than one percent,
whereas
ordinary virgin olive oil can have an acidity of up to 3.3 percent.
Lower
quality oils can be diluted or refined to bring the acidity down so
they can
be labeled as extra virgin. But now the oil has been adulterated, and
that's
not what you want. The "extra virgin" label is no guarantee of
quality. Most
of it has been processed in ways that reduce its nutritional value. To
complicate matters more, the term "extra virgin" has no official
meaning in
the United States. The U.S. is not a member of the International Olive
Oil
Council. So olive oil sold here can be labeled "extra virgin" without
meeting
the accepted international standards.

Nowhere does it say that "extra virgin" olive oil has to be made 100%
from
olives. Soaring demand for olive oil has outstripped the available
supply.
Very simply, more olive oil is sold than is produced. Manufacturers
often
dilute the olive oil with other oils. This may be the biggest food
fraud of
the 20th Century. Investigators have gathered evidence indicating that
the
biggest olive oil brands in Italy, Bertolli, Sasso, and Cirio, have
for years
been systematically diluting their extra virgin olive oil with cheap,
highly
refined hazelnut oil imported from Turkey. Despite the fact that
details of
this scandal have been published in Merum, a Swiss-German magazine,
and in
Italian journals such as Agra Trade, and the newspaper Gazzetta del
Mezzogiorno,
this information has been successfully suppressed and is known to only
a handful
of people. International arrest warrants have been issued and seized
documents
indicate that at least 10,000 tons of hazelnut oil are involved. As
much as 20%
refined hazelnut oil can be added to olive oil and still be
undetectable to the consumer.

A recent study in Italy found that only 40% of the olive oil brands
labeled
"extra virgin" actually met those standards. Italy produces 400,000
tons of
olive oil for domestic consumption, but 750,000 tons are sold. The
difference
is made up with highly-refined, nut and seed oils.  Less strict
guidelines
make the situation even worse in the United States. Like in Italy,
more oil is
"produced" in California than there are olives available. The
difference is
made up with less expensive, highly refined oils such as corn and
sunflower.

This is scary stuff when you consider how extremely important oil is
to human
health. Our modern chronic disease problems are the result of, in a
short
period of time, fundamentally changing our diet. One of the most
fundamental
changes has been the type and the amount of fats and oils that we
consume.
The mass-consumption of refined and hydrogenated oils has proved to be
a disaster
for human health. Hydrogenated oils have been implicated in both our
cancer
and heart disease epidemics. All modern processed oils are injurious
to human
health. To reverse our pandemic of chronic disease, we have to return
to
eating a more traditional diet, and high quality olive oil can safely
be
included in that diet. It's not so much the case that olive oil should
be
added to the diet as it is that healthy, real olive oil should be used
to
replace the unhealthy, processed oils now being consumed.

How does one ensure that they are eating the most healthful oil? Find
an extra
virgin olive oil that is cold pressed, unfiltered, and looks cloudy.
Factory
produced olive oil looks clear. If it=92s clear, it has been filtered
which
further reduces the nutritional quality of the oil. Real olive oil is
not
filtered and looks cloudy. The oil should be packaged in dark glass
bottles to
protect it from the damaging effects of light. Real olive oil is still
produced in small estate bottled settings. The challenge is to find
one that
does it all right.

After selecting the oil, it has to be stored properly. When properly
stored,
real extra virgin olive oil can last two to three years. Because of
processing, most of the extra virgin oil on the market has a shelf
life of
only a few months. A good rule of thumb is to purchase oil in small
bottles
and consume it within a year of purchase; this will also ensure
getting the
best flavor. Store the oil away from both heat and light. Storing in a
dark
place is important because exposure to light causes reactions that
destroy the
oil thousands of times faster than just oxygen alone. During storage,
olive
oil oxidizes and undergoes a slow, continuous, and irreversible
deterioration
until it becomes toxic and inedible.  Oxidized (rancid) oils should
never be
consumed.

The bottom line is that modern, factory-produced olive oil has been
stripped
of its health-enhancing nutrients, and the task of selecting a high
quality
oil has been made very difficult. That's why Beyond Health has made
the
selection process easier for you. We have searched for high quality,
estate
bottled oils that meet our strict standards. After an eight-month
search, we
found only one, and that was Bariani. Now, more than a year later, we
still
have not found another that meets our standards. Bariani does it all
right.
It's produced on a small family farm in the Central Valley of
California.
Their olives are grown without pesticides. They are hand picked from
the
trees, carefully washed and dried, and milled with a stone wheel
within 48
hours of harvesting. The paste is then pressed in a hydraulic press,
and the
oil collected in stainless steel vats, decanted, and bottled. This
first cold
pressed oil is the genuine stuff and retains all the natural flavor
and
goodness. Bariani is available at specialty food stores in California,
or by
calling 800-250-3063.

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Raymond Francis is an M.I.T.-trained scientist and an internationally
recognized leader in the emerging field of optimal health maintenance.
He
spent several months researching the scandal in the olive oil industry
and
studying olive oil chemistry and production methods. Finding an olive
oil he
could recommend took many more months.

Joe Sixpack