The olive oil consumption surges while prices slightly increase

The World Olive Oil Exhibition (WOOE), ideal meeting place for international trade.

Household olive oil consumption represents 65% of the overall vegetable oils consumed in Spain throughout 2018, according to a study conducted by the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, which indicates a global rise of 2.3% in terms of volume and a slight drop in price of 1.5%.

The olive oil or refined oil captures most of the consumption accounting for 32.1%, followed by extra virgin olive oil with 22.4% and virgin olive oil with 10.5%; and the olive pomace oil represents 0.9% of the total consumption.

Excluding the olive pomace oil, the total olive oil consumption in homes accounted for 355.5 million liters amounting to almost 1,600 million euros; and the consumption per person and per year was of approximately 8 liters, without taking the on-premises and social catering consumption into account. The most consumed oil is olive oil accounting for 3.83 liters, followed by the EVOO accounting for 2.67 liters and the virgin olive oil accounting for 1.25 liters.

At the same time, last week a slight increase in prices occurred; which some believe to be circumstantial, whereas others attribute it to the uncertainty regarding the harvest of the following olive campaign on a global scale.

The prices given by the Ministry estimate the liter of EVOO at 4.28 euros, the liter of virgin olive oil at 3.79 euros and the liter of olive oil or refined oil at 3.48 euros. The virgin olive oil and EVOO consumption increased by 3.8% and by 2.5% respectively, whilst the olive oil consumption dropped by 6.5%.

This information comes at an exciting moment for the sector, that will conclude with the supply of olive oils from the next campaign within the World Olive Oil Exhibition (WOOE), which will be held on the 18^th and 19^th of March 2020.