Dried apricots
Commercial types
The dried apricot is the clearest example on this page of a product whose identity is decided by processing rather than by variety. The same fruit, from the same orchard, in the same week, becomes two commercially different products depending on one decision taken at the drying yard: whether it is sulphured or not. Everything a buyer argues about afterwards — colour, shelf life, label declarations, the market it can be sold into — follows from that.
Three types drive the trade. Sulphured apricots are treated with SO₂ to hold the light yellow-to-orange colour that most consumers recognise as "dried apricot". Natural (unsulphured) apricots are brown, and are a separate quality class in their own right rather than a downgrade — a substantial market buys them specifically. Industrial quality is pitted, mixed-size, with colour defects permitted, and goes into further processing rather than onto a shelf.
Codex defines six presentation styles: whole unpitted, whole pitted, whole pitted and stuffed, halves, slabs and kamaradin. In Turkish origin, Malatya and Ürgüp are regional trade names rather than botanical varieties; the main cultivars behind them are Hacıhaliloğlu, Soğancı, Kabaaşı and Çataloğlu, and those cultivar names very rarely appear on a contract.
What a buyer writes into the specification
- Size. Numbered No. 1 to No. 8, defined by count per kilogram and diameter — No. 1 is up to 100 fruits per kilogram at 36 mm and above; No. 8 is 220 and over at 20 mm and below. Fruit is measured across its shortest diameter in its natural shape, and not more than 10% by weight may fall outside the declared size (AFI). Blending very small fruit with very large fruit to hit an average count is not acceptable under the AFI specification, and it is visible in the carton. Codex additionally allows a descriptive scale from very small to extra large. - Moisture. Codex sets ≤20% for fruit without SO₂ or sorbic acid and ≤25% where either is used. Moisture is also the parameter buyers most often tighten beyond the standard, because it drives both weight and texture. - SO₂. The EU maximum for dried apricots is 2,000 mg/kg, expressed as SO₂ and covering all sources. Above 10 mg/kg a sulphite declaration is mandatory on the label — the single easiest and most expensive labelling omission in this product. - Aflatoxins. EU limits distinguish dried fruit destined for sorting (B₁ 5.0 / total 10.0 µg/kg) from dried fruit placed on the market for the final consumer (B₁ 2.0 / total 4.0 µg/kg). Ochratoxin A: 2.0 µg/kg. Which of the two limits applies is a question about what happens next to the goods, and it belongs in the contract. - Defect tolerances. Codex caps damaged, broken, slabs and insect-damaged fruit individually and sets a 15% total, with mould at 1%. The AFI "Fancy" specification used in US trade is stricter and adds an explicit colour scale.
Packing
The 12.5 kg lined corrugated carton is the common bulk unit, with 5 and 10 kg alternatives where a buyer's own handling calls for it; retail and private label run 200 g to 1 kg in doypack or tray. Cartons are marked with country of origin, packer name and address, net weight, product description, size, lot, crop year and the sulphite declaration. Of those, crop year and lot are the two that matter most, because they are the two that a claim investigation starts from — a carton that cannot be traced to a lot cannot be argued about usefully by either side.
Season
Harvest in Malatya runs July to August, processing August to September, with the export window from September through March and shipments concentrated between October and December. Almost the entire Turkish dried apricot crop is exported, so availability tracks the export calendar closely rather than being buffered by a large domestic market. In practice this means a buyer looking for current-crop fruit in late spring is competing for what is left rather than choosing from what there is.
Typical documents
Aflatoxin report (B₁ and total) · SO₂ / sulphite report · pesticide residue report · moisture and size report · health certificate and, where required, phytosanitary certificate · A.TR or EUR.1 · organic certificate where the goods are organic · approved sample and crop year declaration.
Dried figs
Commercial types
Dried figs are the least industrial product on this list. The variety comes from one place, the drying is done in the sun, and the shaping afterwards is done by hand — which is why in figs the word "type" does not mean a botanical variety at all. It means the form the fruit is given after it has dried, and those forms are bought and sold by name, at different prices, for different markets. A fig contract that names a type without a count per kilogram has described the packaging and not the fruit.
The Turkish trade is built on the Sarılop variety from the Büyük and Küçük Menderes basins in the Aegean, with production concentrated in Aydın and İzmir; the variety grows essentially only there. The types bought by name are layer, protoben, pulled, lerida, lokum, garland, macaroni, baglama, cukulata and umbrella. Lerida is flattened and pressed in rows and is among the most requested. Protoben is a premium aligned pack with the stem and eye concealed. Pulled is domed on top and squared at the base, softer and moister, aimed at retail. Baglama and garland are threaded by hand onto cotton, in chains or in wreaths. Natural is unshaped, calibrated and hand-sorted.
Greece is also a dried fig origin and has registered geographical indications of its own. Where a registered name is to be used commercially, we confirm its exact registered spelling and scope against the EU register before it goes onto a document or a label.
What a buyer writes into the specification
- Type and size together. The shape name alone does not describe a lot; it is quoted with the count per kilogram, which is how figs are calibrated. Class designations (Extra, Class I, Class II) and their size and tolerance limits are defined in the UNECE standard for dried figs, which we cite by reference and verify against the current text before it goes into a contract. - Aflatoxins. Figs are their own line in EU law and, unlike other dried fruit, carry
no sorting/consumer split
B₁ 6.0 / total 10.0 µg/kg, a single limit whatever happens
to the goods next. - Ochratoxin A. 8.0 µg/kg. - Moisture, and SO₂ where used (EU maximum 2,000 mg/kg for figs). - Sorting. UV fluorescence sorting to remove aflatoxin-affected fruit is established industry practice and is frequently written into specifications as a process requirement rather than left implicit — a reasonable thing for a buyer to insist on, and a reasonable thing for a supplier to be asked to evidence.
Packing
10 to 12.5 kg bulk cartons; 200 g to 1 kg retail formats. Inner packing follows the type directly, and this is a point that is often missed at specification stage: lerida and protoben are pressed row packs and need trays, while baglama and garland are threaded and need an entirely different internal presentation. Where a type is specified, the packing has to be specified with it, or the two arrive at the packing house contradicting each other.
Season
Harvest in Aydın runs August to September, processing September to October, with the export window from October through March and shipments concentrated between November and January. It is a compressed calendar for a product with a long list of hand operations between the tree and the carton, which is part of why lead times in figs tighten quickly once the season is under way.
Typical documents
Aflatoxin and ochratoxin A reports · pesticide residue report · sorting declaration · health and phytosanitary certificates · A.TR or EUR.1 · organic certificate where applicable. Turkish-origin dried figs are subject to increased official controls at EU entry for aflatoxins and ochratoxin A: official certification with sampling and analysis performed in the country of origin, entry through a border control post, and a CHED notification in TRACES. The applicable frequency is set by the current annex and is verified per shipment rather than assumed — which also means the border step is planned into the schedule from the start, instead of appearing as a delay at the end.
Prunes
Commercial types
Prunes are the one product on this page where the most common commercial error is not about quality at all — it is about arithmetic. Two entirely different sizing conventions are in daily use, one European and one American, and a contract that does not say which one it means has left the most important number in the specification ambiguous. The second thing worth knowing about prunes is that the moisture limit and the preservative question are the same question, which is not obvious until it costs somebody money.
Prunes are produced from prune plums by removing most of the water; they may be processed with water or steam and may carry a permitted preservative. The trade splits first by presentation — unpitted or whole pitted — and then by size. The USDA standard groups varieties into Types I to IV and gives each type its own size scale.
What a buyer writes into the specification
- Size. Two languages exist and it matters which one your contract uses: count per 500 g in the European convention (giant through to small cooking prunes, as set out in the UNECE standard) and count per pound in the US convention, where USDA additionally recommends the descriptive names extra large, large, medium and small. The two scales are not interchangeable and cannot be converted casually in a negotiation. - Grade. USDA grades run U.S. Grade A / Fancy, Grade B / Choice, Grade C / Standard and Substandard, with defect ceilings for each. - Moisture. Under USDA, Grade A carries a 25% limit where the average size is 60 count per pound or fewer and 24% at 61 and above — but that limit applies only to non-hermetic bulk packs of 10 lb and over with no preservative added. Where a preservative is used there is no moisture limit in the standard at all. This is precisely why the contract has to state both facts: quoting a moisture maximum without saying whether a preservative is present is quoting half a term. - Contaminants and additives. EU aflatoxin limits for dried fruit (B₁ 5.0 / total 10.0 µg/kg for sorting; B₁ 2.0 / total 4.0 for consumer-ready), ochratoxin A 2.0 µg/kg, SO₂ up to 2,000 mg/kg and sorbates up to 1,000 mg/kg where used.
Packing
Bulk cartons and retail packs according to the buyer's format. The bulk unit referenced by the US moisture rule is the non-hermetic pack of 10 lb and over; beyond that, packing in prunes is a specification item rather than an industry constant, and we quote it as agreed rather than presenting somebody's house format as a standard.
Season
Prune supply follows the crop calendar of the origin being offered, and we deliberately do not publish a calendar for it. The research behind this site could not source one we were prepared to print, and a harvest calendar that is wrong is worse than no calendar at all — it produces delivery expectations that cannot be met. Crop year and availability are confirmed at the quotation stage, per origin, per lot.
Typical documents
Aflatoxin and ochratoxin A reports · pesticide residue report · SO₂ or sorbate report where a preservative is used · moisture and count report · health and phytosanitary certificates · A.TR or EUR.1 · organic certificate where applicable.
Raisins
Commercial types
More than any other dried fruit, the raisin is a processing product. The grape that becomes a golden sultana and the grape that becomes a dark, untreated raisin can be the same grape from the same vineyard, separated only by whether it went through an alkali and oil dip before drying. Around nine-tenths of the Turkish crop is dipped; the rest is not. That single choice sets the colour, and colour is the first thing a raisin buyer specifies — which is why a raisin contract quotes a colour code and a calibre together and treats either one alone as incomplete.
The Turkish seedless raisin trades internationally as Sultana / Sultanina, the same grape known in the United States as Thompson Seedless; the Turkish cultivars behind it are Yuvarlak Çekirdeksiz and Sultani. Codex separates seedless from seed-bearing types and defines three styles — non-seeded, seeded (mechanically de-seeded) and clusters. Grapes may be washed or unwashed, stemmed or unstemmed, dipped in an alkali and oil solution or left natural, and bleached or unbleached. Malaga Muscatel is a distinct type with its own moisture limit. Corinthian currants — the Greek speciality — are a separate trade item, outside the Codex raisin standard, and are contracted as such rather than as a variant of it.
Roughly four kilograms of fresh grapes yield one kilogram of raisins. The dip, where it is used, is a potassium carbonate and olive oil solution applied before drying; it speeds the drying and produces the amber colour. Undipped fruit dries slower and comes out dark. Both are legitimate products with their own buyers, and neither is a defective version of the other.
What a buyer writes into the specification
- Colour type. The Turkish trade codes colour as No. 7 (near black) through No. 8 (dark), No. 9 (brownish), No. 10 (light brown) to No. 11 (light brown to golden), under the TS 3411 classification, alongside the bleached / unbleached / dipped grouping. - Calibre. Berries per 100 g: jumbo under 220, standard 221–300, medium 301–400, small 401–550, small-small above 551. Colour type and calibre are quoted together — separately, neither of them describes the lot, and a buyer who specifies only one has left the other to the packer's discretion. - Moisture. Codex sets ≤18% for most types and styles, ≤19% for the seeded style and ≤31% for Malaga Muscatel. - Ochratoxin A is the critical contaminant for dried vine fruit: EU limit 8.0 µg/kg. Aflatoxins follow the general dried fruit limits; SO₂ up to 2,000 mg/kg where the fruit is bleached or sulphured, with a sulphite declaration mandatory above 10 mg/kg. - Defects. Codex names them precisely — pieces of stem, cap-stems above 3 mm, immature or undeveloped berries, damaged, sugared, and seeds. That vocabulary is worth borrowing wholesale into a quality clause, because it is the vocabulary a surveyor will use.
Packing
Under TS 3411 the maximum pack weight is 15 kg net, in new, clean, odourless material, with industrial grades in sacks of at least 15 kg and a ±2% weight tolerance on consumer packs. Retail and private label run 200 g to 1 kg. Odour transfer is a real risk in this product, which is why the standard specifies the condition of the packaging material and not only its size.
Season
Harvest in the Aegean runs July to September, with picking decided by sugar measurement rather than by date and generally under way from the middle of August; processing runs August to October; the export window is October through March, concentrated between November and February. Production sits in Manisa, Denizli and İzmir, with Manisa carrying by far the largest share.
Typical documents
Ochratoxin A report · aflatoxin report · pesticide residue report · SO₂ report for bleached or sulphured lots · moisture, colour type and calibre report · health and phytosanitary certificates · A.TR or EUR.1 · organic certificate where applicable.
Hazelnuts
Commercial types
Everything about a hazelnut specification comes back to one number: moisture. A nut dried properly stores for months and travels ambient across the world without incident. A nut that went into storage a little too wet develops an aflatoxin problem that no amount of later sorting fully solves, and aflatoxin is the parameter that decides whether a container clears the EU border. That is why this product has the longest export window on the page and, at the same time, the least forgiving quality file.
Traded in-shell or as shelled kernels, and within kernels as natural (with pellicle),
blanched
, roasted, diced, sliced, meal or paste. The Turkish trade names — Giresun,
Akçakoca, Ordu and Levant — function as origin-and-quality designations rather than cultivar names; the cultivar most associated with quality is Tombul, grown around Giresun and Trabzon, and Giresun Tombul was granted EU protected designation of origin recognition in 2022. The AFI specification recognises two classes: Extra and Class I.
What a buyer writes into the specification
- Moisture ≤6% (AOCS Ab2-49), with 3–6% the usual pre-packing band. This is the single most important storage parameter for the product, and it is the number an experienced buyer checks before they check the price. - Size. Measured on the maximum diameter of the mid-section using round-hole screens. Minimum size for Extra and Class I is 9 mm (6–9 mm is allowed for piccolo types), and a "sized" lot must hold a maximum spread of 2 mm. The trade also quotes count per ounce against named size bands — regular FAQ, Standard No. 2, Standard No. 1 and Special Standard. Millimetres and count per ounce belong in the specification together; either one alone leaves room for argument. - Class difference. Twins are limited to 1% by weight in Extra and 5% in Class I; mechanical damage and pieces to 3% and 5%; shell fragments and dust to 0.2%; foreign matter to 0.05%. Kernels missing more than a third are classed as pieces and must not pass a 5 mm round screen. - Aflatoxins. Hazelnuts have their own EU line: for nuts to be sorted or physically treated, B₁ 8.0 / total 15.0 µg/kg; for nuts placed on the market for the final consumer or used as a food ingredient, B₁ 5.0 / total 10.0 µg/kg. And one rule quietly sets the price relationship between in-shell and kernel: when in-shell nuts are analysed, all contamination is assumed to be in the edible part. A buyer who understands that rule reads an in-shell aflatoxin certificate very differently from one who does not.
Packing
New, clean, dry, leak-proof containers, hermetically closed, with no paper liner where that is appropriate, and closed without staples unless the buyer specifies otherwise. Both ends of each carton are marked with product and brand, packer name and address, grade, crop year, packing date, net weight, origin and destination, and the bill of lading must list the carton count, origin and marks. Tare is capped at 2.5% on sacks of 50 kg and over and 3.5% on smaller sacks. Fumigation is permitted where it complies with the destination's rules;
ethylene dibromide is prohibited
. In ordinary trade practice, bulk moves in 10–25 kg
vacuum kraft or polyethylene bags or in cartons, according to the buyer's specification.
Season
Harvest on the Black Sea coast runs August to September, processing September to November. The export window is September through June — the longest of the products on this page — with shipments concentrated between October and March. The long window is a direct consequence of the dryness: a well-dried kernel is a storable commodity, which gives both sides of a hazelnut contract more room to manoeuvre on timing than any other product here.
Typical documents
Aflatoxin report (B₁ and total) · moisture report (AOCS Ab2-49) · size and count-per-ounce report · pesticide residue report and heavy metals on request · fumigation declaration where applicable · health and phytosanitary certificates · A.TR or EUR.1 · organic certificate where applicable · crop year declaration.
Pistachios
Commercial types
The pistachio is priced on appearance more openly than anything else on this list. Size, split rate and colour do most of the work, and in the peeled green kernel — the one that goes into baklava and ice cream — colour is very nearly the entire product. Underneath that sits the strictest contaminant file of the eight: pistachios carry their own EU limits for both aflatoxins and ochratoxin A, and Turkish-origin material is subject to increased official controls on entry. Both facts have to be planned for rather than reacted to.
Traded in-shell (naturally split or unsplit), as shelled kernels, and as peeled green kernels for confectionery and ice cream, as well as roasted and salted for retail. In Turkish origin, Antep and Siirt are the two trade names. In Greek origin the reference product is the Aegina pistachio (Φιστίκι Αιγίνης), a protected designation of origin from the volcanic soil of the Saronic Gulf, known for its intense green colour.
Where a registered geographical indication is to be used commercially we confirm the exact registered name and scope against the EU register first. For Gaziantep, for instance, the EU registrations cover processed products such as baklava and pistachio paste — which is not the same thing as a registration on the raw nut, and the difference is one an importer's legal department will notice even if a marketing brochure does not.
What a buyer writes into the specification
- Size. Count per ounce before roasting, under the USDA scale: Colossal under 18,
Extra Large
18–20, Large 21–25, Medium 26–30, Small over 30. Uniformity is
controlled by rule — the heaviest 10% of the sample by count may not weigh more than 1.50 times the lightest 10%, and the average count may not deviate from the declared range by more than half a nut. Those two rules exist to stop a lot being averaged into a size band it does not really belong in. - Minimum size and undersize. Not smaller than 30/64 inch on a round-hole screen, with undersize tolerances of 4–5% depending on grade. - Dryness. "Well dried" means the kernel is hard and crisp; "very well dried" additionally requires a lot average moisture of ≤7.00%. If the claim is going on a document, the moisture result has to support it. - Shell defects. Non-split shells, shells split other than at the suture, adhering hulls, light stain and dark stain are each defined and counted separately — a level of granularity that is worth mirroring in the quality clause rather than summarising. - Contaminants. Pistachios sit in their own EU lines for both mycotoxins: aflatoxins B₁ 12.0 / total 15.0 µg/kg for nuts to be sorted and B₁ 8.0 / total 10.0 for consumer-ready; ochratoxin A 10.0 µg/kg to be sorted and 5.0 consumer-ready. As with hazelnuts, in-shell analysis assumes all contamination is in the edible part.
Packing
There is no single industry standard for pistachio packing. In practice bulk moves in 10–25 kg vacuum bags or cartons and the format is set by the buyer's specification, along with the marking and the crop year declaration. Where a supplier presents their own format as an industry norm, it is worth asking whose norm it is.
Season
Harvest runs from late summer into early autumn depending on origin; on Aegina it runs from mid-August to the end of September. We do not publish an export window for pistachios, because the research behind this site could not source one at the same standard of evidence as the other products. Crop year and availability are confirmed per lot at quotation instead.
Typical documents
Aflatoxin and ochratoxin A reports — both are asked for, because both have their own EU limits for this product · moisture report where a "very well dried" claim is made · size (count per ounce) and split-rate report · pesticide residue report · health and phytosanitary certificates · A.TR or EUR.1 · organic certificate where applicable.
Turkish-origin pistachios, their mixtures and products derived from them are subject to
increased official controls
at EU entry for aflatoxins — as is US-origin material
consigned from Türkiye — which means official certification, sampling and analysis in the country of origin and entry through a border control post with a CHED notification. This is schedule information as much as compliance information: a border inspection that was planned for is an extra few days, and one that was not is a missed delivery date.
Table olives
Commercial types
No other product here is defined by as many independent decisions as the table olive, and almost all of them are invisible in the finished jar. When it was picked decides the type. How it was cured decides the preparation. How it was cut or filled decides the style. A specification that names one of the three has named a third of the product. And then there is drained weight — the number that generates more commercial disputes in packed olives than every other parameter combined, and the one most often left to be assumed.
A table olive's commercial identity is the product of three axes, and a buyer's specification names all three.
Type, by ripeness at harvest:
green olives, picked at full size before the colour
turns; olives turning colour, picked during the colour change; black olives, picked at or just before full ripeness.
Commercial preparation, by process:
treated olives, which have undergone alkali
treatment; natural olives, placed directly in brine and fermented, wholly or partly;
dehydrated and/or shrivelled
olives, preserved in brine or in dry salt; olives darkened
by oxidation, which are darkened to a uniform brownish-black in an alkaline medium, packed hermetically and heat-sterilised; and specialities, prepared by methods other than or additional to these.
Style, by presentation:
whole; cracked, where the flesh is opened without breaking
the stone; split, cut lengthwise through skin and flesh; and, for pitted product,
stoned, halved, quartered, divided, sliced, chopped/minced
and broken, plus
stuffed
olives, salad olives and medleys.
A note on grilled and marinated olives.
Neither the Codex standard nor the IOC trade
standard defines a "grilled" or "roasted" type. Products of that kind fall under
specialities
or other styles, which is a real and legitimate category with three
conditions attached: the product must be sufficiently distinguishable from the defined styles, it must meet the standard's requirements through the style it most closely resembles, and it must be described on the label clearly enough not to mislead. Cracked and
split
, by contrast, are defined styles and can be contracted under their standard names.
We make that distinction explicit in the specification, because it decides how the product is labelled — and a labelling decision taken loosely at specification stage is a labelling problem at the destination.
Greek varieties in commercial use include Kalamata (Kalamon), Chalkidiki,
Konservolia
(Amfissis, Artas, Stylidas, Piliou Volou) and Throumba (Thassos, Chios),
several of which carry registered designations. Registered names are verified against the EU register before they appear on a label or a document.
What a buyer writes into the specification
- Calibre, the number most argued over: the count per kilogram, on the scale that runs 60/70, 71/80 and so on up to 381/410, with 50-unit intervals above 410 and 20-unit intervals for stuffed olives from 201/220. For pitted and stuffed olives the declared calibre is that of the original whole fruit. Uniformity is controlled by a 4 mm rule on the transverse diameter, with over- and under-size tolerances of ±10%, ±5% or ±2% depending on the interval. Calibration is optional under Codex but mandatory under the IOC standard. - Trade category. Extra (Fancy, A), First (Choice, Select, B) and Second (Standard, C). Classification is optional under Codex, but where a lot is classified these names must be used; the IOC additionally requires Extra to be larger than 351/380. Whole, stoned and stuffed styles must in any case meet at least the Second category requirements. - Brine chemistry. Minimum sodium chloride of 5.0% for treated olives, 6.0% for natural olives and 8.0% for dehydrated or shrivelled olives, with maximum pH 4.3 for treated, natural and pasteurised preparations. These are stability parameters before they are taste parameters: brine that drifts out of specification is a shelf-life problem. - Drained weight. Minimum 50% for whole olives and 40% for pitted and stuffed, calculated on the weight of distilled water the container holds when full at 20 °C, with a deduction of 20 ml for non-metallic rigid containers such as glass jars, and no minimum below 110 units per kilogram. Declared drained weight carries tolerances of 5%, 4%, 3% or 2% depending on container size, with lot acceptance on an AQL 6.5 sampling plan. This is the single most common source of commercial dispute in packed olives, and it is entirely preventable by writing the figure, the tolerance and the sampling plan into the contract. - Defects, named as the standard names them: harmless extraneous material, blemished fruit (a mark larger than 9 mm²), mutilated, broken and shrivelled fruit, abnormal texture and colour, stems over 3 mm, defective stuffing, stone fragments over 2 mm, and soft or excessively soft fruit — with individual and cumulative ceilings by category. - Additives. Sorbic acid and sorbates up to 1,000 mg/kg, benzoic acid and benzoates up to 500 mg/kg, the combination up to 1,000 mg/kg. Sulphur dioxide is not permitted in olives. Ferrous gluconate (E 579) and ferrous lactate (E 585) are permitted at 150 mg/kg
only in olives darkened by oxidation
— which is why their presence in an ingredient list
distinguishes an oxidation-darkened black olive from a naturally black one, in labelling and in price. A buyer comparing two black olive offers should read the ingredient list before the price list.
Packing
Bulk in drums and barrels; foodservice in 2–10 kg pails and tins; retail in glass jars, tins and vacuum pouches. Labelling is prescribed rather than free: the name "olives" or "table olives", accompanied by the type, the commercial preparation, the style (with the stuffing named where the olives are stuffed) and the size, some of which may be omitted where the pack is transparent and the fruit is visible. On non-retail containers the information may travel in the accompanying documents, but the product name, lot identification, the name and address of the producer, packer, distributor or importer, and the storage instructions must appear on the container itself.
Season
In Greece, Konservolia for green processing is picked from mid-September to mid-October and for black from mid-November to mid-January; Kalamata (Kalamon) runs November to December, sometimes into January; Chalkidiki green olives are hand-picked from
mid-September to mid-October
. Harvest dates shift by year and by region, and the fruit
then needs its curing time before it becomes a product — so the gap between harvest and availability is longer here than in the dried fruit, and a buyer working back from a delivery date needs to allow for it.
Typical documents
Physico-chemical report — salt, pH, drained weight, calibre and defect count · microbiological analysis where the preparation calls for it · pesticide residue and heavy metal reports · additive declaration covering sorbates, benzoates and, where used, E 579 / E 585 · health certificate · A.TR or EUR.1 for Turkish origin · organic certificate where applicable · where a registered designation is claimed, the corresponding conformity documentation. Established importers additionally expect a GFSI-recognised food safety certification (BRCGS, IFS or FSSC 22000) from the packing site.
Olive oil
Commercial categories
Olive oil is one of the very few foods whose category names are set out in law, which changes the nature of the transaction. In every other product on this page the specification is negotiated between the parties. Here, a large part of it is already written: what may be called extra virgin, what may be called olive oil, and what may never be called either is defined by regulation and tested against defined methods. That makes the contract simpler and the consequences of getting it wrong more serious, because a misdescription in olive oil is not a commercial disagreement, it is a labelling offence.
Virgin olive oils
are obtained from the fruit by mechanical or other physical means only,
under conditions that do not alter the oil, and have undergone no treatment beyond washing, decantation, centrifugation and filtration.
Olive pomace oils
are obtained from olive pomace by solvent or physical treatment and form
a separate family: crude olive pomace oil (for refining or technical use), refined olive pomace oil (≤ 0.30 g/100 g) and olive pomace oil, a blend with virgin oil (≤ 1.00 g/100 g).
Olive pomace oil may never be sold under the designation "olive oil".
This is the most
frequent misdescription in the trade, and it is an offence rather than a shorthand.
What a buyer writes into the specification
- The chemical panel, not just acidity: peroxide value (≤20 mEq O₂/kg for the virgin grades), the UV absorbances K₂₃₂, K₂₇₀ and ΔK, moisture and volatiles, insoluble impurities, iron and copper, and — for extra virgin — fatty acid ethyl esters at ≤35 mg/kg, which is the standard indicator of how the fruit was handled between the grove and the mill. - The sensory panel. An oil is extra virgin only if the median of defects is 0.0 and the median of fruitiness is above 0.0. Acidity alone does not make an oil extra virgin — a widespread and technically wrong shorthand that costs somebody money every season. In the EU the panel assessment is part of the conformity check, and for a virgin-grade claim it is not optional. - Purity and authenticity. Fatty acid composition by gas chromatography within the defined ranges (oleic 55.00–85.00%, linolenic ≤1.00% and so on) and the sterol profile; stigmastadienes where adulteration is a concern. - Contaminants. Heavy metals and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons under the EU contaminant regulation, pesticide residues under the EU MRL regime, and MOSH/MOAH — mineral oil hydrocarbons — for which there is as yet no EU limit, but which buyers routinely write into specifications anyway. We flag that distinction rather than blur it, because a buyer is entitled to know when a test they are paying for is a private requirement rather than a legal one.
Packing
For the final consumer, EU rules cap the container at 5 litres and require a tamper-evident closure that cannot be resealed after first opening. Common retail volumes are 0.5 and 1 litre, with 0.50 and 0.75 litre used for premium oils, typically in dark glass or tin. Foodservice runs 5 to 25 litres in tin or bag-in-box.
In bulk — which is where brokerage volume actually sits — oil moves in flexitanks of roughly 20–24 tonnes inside a 20' container, IBCs of 1,000 litres, drums of 200 litres, or ISO tanks. Protection from light, oxygen and heat governs every one of those choices, and on long or cold routes thermal protection is specified so that the oil arrives fluid enough to discharge. Oil that has been allowed to cool and set is not damaged, but it is a discharge problem, and discharge problems are charged by the hour.
Labelling
Mandatory on the pack: the category description; the storage instruction "store away from light and heat", required for all categories; the packing plant identification number; and the origin declaration, which is mandatory for extra virgin and virgin oils and prohibited for refined blends and pomace oils. Where the olives are harvested in one place and pressed in another, both must be declared. Optional claims are permitted but conditional: "first cold pressing", "cold extraction", organoleptic attributes (virgin grades only) and the harvesting year — with the harvesting year subject to national rules that vary between member states, which is a detail worth checking per destination rather than per brand.
The current EU framework is Regulation (EU) No 1308/2013, Annex VII Part VIII for the definitions, Delegated Regulation (EU) 2022/2104 for the marketing standards, packaging and labelling, and Implementing Regulation (EU) 2022/2105 for conformity checks and methods of analysis.
Season
Olive oil is an annual, single-harvest product, and that shapes the whole trade in it. In Greece the harvest runs broadly from October to January across the Peloponnese and Crete, with new-crop oil coming to market from November. Because there is only one crop a year and no second run, the harvest year and the analysis date are part of the commercial identity of the oil rather than administrative details attached to it. An oil analysed in December and an oil analysed the following August may carry the same category and be very different propositions.
Typical documents
Full Certificate of Analysis — free acidity, peroxide value, K₂₃₂, K₂₇₀, ΔK, moisture and volatiles, insoluble impurities, iron and copper, and FAEE for extra virgin · sensory panel report for virgin grades · purity analysis: fatty acid composition, sterol profile, stigmastadienes · pesticide residue, heavy metal and PAH reports · MOSH/MOAH report where the buyer requires it · origin and harvest year evidence supporting the label claim · health certificate · A.TR or EUR.1 for Turkish origin · organic certificate where applicable · registered designation documentation where a PDO or PGI name is used. A GFSI-recognised certification of the packing site is a standard expectation from established importers.
Private label
How the project runs
Private label looks like a product decision and is mostly a project management one. Very little tends to go wrong with the oil itself. What goes wrong is artwork that was signed off before the destination's labelling rules were checked, a minimum order quantity that turned out to be set by a bottle mould nobody had priced, or a responsibility split that nobody wrote down until an auditor asked who was accountable for the nutrition declaration. The sequence below is written for olive oil, where private label is most common, but it applies just as well to table olives, dried fruit and nuts, with the product-specific differences noted at the end.
1. Brief and product selection. The brand owner sets the category (extra virgin, olive oil, organic), the target price point and the target market. The oil is selected on the sensory panel and the Certificate of Analysis together, and the category claim is locked at this point — not later, when the artwork already says it. 2. Packaging selection. Bottle (custom mould or stock bottle), closure and capsule, tin, carton and pallet configuration. A custom bottle mould is the single item that pushes the minimum order quantity up the most; starting on a stock bottle keeps the first run small and the risk with it. 3. Artwork. The filler supplies the dieline; the brand owner's design is fitted to it. 4. Regulatory check. The label content is checked against the destination market's rules before print. This is the last cheap moment to change anything, and it is the step that is most often skipped because it is the least visible. 5. Pilot fill and approved sample. A golden sample is approved and the lot is signed off against it. 6. Production, Certificate of Analysis and shipping documents.
Minimum order quantity — how it is actually set
There is no industry-standard MOQ, and a supplier quoting one as a fixed rule is quoting their own constraint rather than a market fact. Three costs impose a minimum, and whichever of them binds first sets the number: the label print run, the bottle mould or pallet quantity, and the changeover time on the filling line. We work the figure out per project from whichever of those three is binding for your format — which is also why the answer to "what is your MOQ" is a question rather than a number.
Who is responsible for what
Under EU food information law, the food business operator responsible for the food information is the operator under whose name or business name the food is marketed — and where that operator is not established in the EU, the responsibility passes to the importer. In practice this divides as follows:
The olive-oil-specific label layer
On top of the general rules, private label olive oil carries the category description, the "store away from light and heat" instruction, the origin declaration (mandatory for extra virgin and virgin, prohibited for refined blends and pomace), the packing plant identification number, the 5-litre limit and the tamper-evident closure. None of those are negotiable, and all of them have to survive contact with the design.
Private label in the other products
It works the same way for table olives, dried fruit and nuts, with three differences worth naming. For table olives, the front-of-pack content is more tightly prescribed by the standard — type, preparation, style and size — so the artwork has less freedom than it does on an oil bottle; a transparent pack removes some of those obligations, which is a regulatory option rather than a design decision, and it is worth knowing which one you are exercising. For dried apricots, figs, raisins and prunes, the sulphite declaration above 10 mg/kg is mandatory and is the easiest and most expensive thing to omit; crop year belongs on the pack as well. For hazelnuts and pistachios, the tree nut allergen declaration and the aflatoxin file are the two items that decide whether a retail listing survives its first audit.
Standing note for the products page footer
The thresholds cited on this page are those of the public standards named beside them. The binding document in any transaction is the agreed specification, and buyer specifications are frequently stricter than the standard. Regulatory limits and control requirements are amended regularly and are verified per shipment.
# PAGE 5 — ABOUT · `/en/about/`