China and Olive Oil Imports

There are apparently growing calls in China for greater regulation on labeling of imported olive oil to protect consumers from lower quality olive-pomace oil parading as olive oil. More here at the People's Daily online. China's official Statistics show that China's olive oil imports, sourced mainly from Spain, Italy and Greece, grew from 392 tons in 2001 to 4,500 tons in 2005. In the first two months of 2006, China imported 1,225 tons of olive oil.  The article notes that lower quality olive-pomace oil - made from olive residue - made up 42.1% of the total, up 23.5 percentage points year on year.