Olive oil export guides: sourcing, quality, customs, payment

Guide

In brief

This page brings together the 36 guides we publish on buying and exporting Tunisian bulk olive oil. They are written for two profiles: the buyer — importer, bottler, retail buying group, brand owner — who wants to secure a first container without getting the commercial category or the customs regime wrong; and the Tunisian exporter, who has to master the ONH licence, the EU quota and the repatriation of export earnings. Each guide stands on its own, but together they follow the real order of a shipment: choose an origin, verify quality on the COA, gather the certifications, clear customs, ship, get paid.

How these guides fit together

A bulk olive oil import rarely fails on price. It fails on one link in the chain: a commercial category that does not match the certificate of analysis, a missing origin document that forfeits the quota benefit, a label that does not comply with the destination market, or a badly chosen payment method.

The guides are therefore grouped into eight families, in the order the questions actually arise:

Sourcing and first order — find and qualify a supplier, negotiate, place the order.
Quality, analysis and varieties — know what you are buying, and prove it.
Certifications and food safety — obtain what your channel requires.
Customs, market access and labeling — enter the destination market.
Transport and port logistics — get the goods out of the port.
Payment and securing the sale — collect without risk.
Pricing, margins and outlets — build a price that holds all the way to the shelf.
Tunisian regulations on the exporter's side — the obligations specific to Tunisia.

1. Sourcing and first order

The entry point for a buyer discovering the Tunisian origin.

Importing Tunisian olive oil — The full path in 8 steps: quality, ONH-licensed supplier, incoterm, customs, documents and payment.
Choosing a reliable supplier — Export licence, per-lot COA, certifications, sample and a clear contract: due diligence and red flags.
Succeeding with your first order — Sample, MOQ, incoterm, secured payment, documents and receipt: the steps and the pitfalls of a first purchase.
Negotiating olive oil in B2B — The seven buyer levers, the seller's floor price, payment and COA-based quality: bring everything back to the landed price.
Sourcing at trade shows — Prepare, prospect, qualify and follow up at SIAL, Gulfood, Anuga or WOOE, with the questions to ask.
Comparing origins — Price, quality and volumes of the world's main origins, and the arbitrage method to pick yours.

2. Quality, analysis and varieties

What the laboratory says outranks what the seller says. These five guides make you self-sufficient when reading a lot.

IOC and EU quality standards — Commercial categories and IOC/T.15 and EU 2022/2104 thresholds: acidity, peroxide, K232, K270, purity criteria.
Reading a COA line by line — The certificate of analysis decoded parameter by parameter, so you can check the announced category yourself.
Tunisian varieties — Chemlali, Chetoui, Oueslati, Sahli: sensory profiles, polyphenols, uses and how to choose by market.
Polyphenols and the EFSA health claim — EU regulation 432/2012, the 250 mg/kg threshold and how the claim is used as a B2B argument.
Storing olive oil — Light, air, heat and time: how to store a bulk lot without downgrading it before its best-before date.

3. Certifications and food safety

No certification is universal: each one opens a specific channel. Start with the decision map.

Certifications by market and channel — Which certification for which market and channel, at what cost, and in what order to obtain them.
Organic: EU 2018/848, USDA NOP, Ecocert — Three-year conversion, choosing the certifier, annual audit and TRACES on EU import.
HACCP for olive oil — The seven principles, the hazards specific to olive oil, the critical control points and the link with IFS/BRC and ISO 22000.

See also our pillar page on certifications and the quality process applied to every lot.

4. Customs, market access and labeling

The largest family, because this is where landed cost and the risk of a blocked container are decided.

Customs and trade agreements — Duties by market: EU quota at 0%, out-of-quota rate, GAFTA, EFTA, UK, and the origin documents required.
EU quota: SICAD and AGRIM — The duty-free tariff quota (TRQ 09.4032): SICAD authorisation on the Tunisian side, AGRIM licence on the importer's side.
Country import sheets — Customs duty, VAT, applicable agreement and documents country by country, in a comparison table.
US market: FDA, FSMA, FSVP — FDA registration, US agent, FSVP, Prior Notice and HTS code 1509 to enter the United States.
Labeling by market — Mandatory EU 1169/2011 statements, US Nutrition Facts, Arabic labels for the Gulf, bilingual Canadian labels.
Export document checklist — For each document in the file: who issues it, how long it takes, what it costs, and whether it is blocking.
Document templates — Proforma invoice, packing list, certificate of origin, sales contract: how to fill them in without errors.
Phytosanitary and fumigation — Phytosanitary certificate, fumigation and ISPM 15 wooden pallets with IPPC marking, market by market.

These guides extend the export section and its documentation.

5. Transport and port logistics

Sea transport and bulk packaging — Flexitank, IBC or drum: which packaging to choose, how to load a container and how to insure the cargo.
Port logistics — Radès or Sfax, freight forwarder, loading and sea transit, without demurrage or detention.

The incoterm you choose drives everything else: see incoterms.

6. Payment and securing the sale

The most expensive link when it breaks. Four guides, from choosing the payment method to final collection.

Export payment methods — Advance payment, documentary collection, letter of credit or open account: the risk ladder and the right trade-off.
Documentary letter of credit — The eight-step mechanics, the documents required, the costs and the discrepancies that block payment.
COTUNACE export credit insurance — Commercial and political risk, buyer approval and indemnification of an unpaid receivable.
Repatriating export earnings — Foreign-exchange obligation, the 150-day deadline and bank domiciliation, on the Tunisian exporter's side.

7. Pricing, margins and outlets

Export price and margins — The EXW, FOB, CIF, landed and shelf cascade, the margin of each link and the hidden costs that erase it.
Launching your brand in OEM — Supplier, packaging, labeling, certifications, MOQ, cost price and the private-label contract.
Getting listed in retail and private label — IFS/BRC certification, supplier file, tender, audit and specifications.
Responding to public tenders — UGAP, WFP/UNGM, local authorities: where to find them, how to qualify and how to build a winning bid.
Selling on Amazon FBA in the USA — FDA and FSVP compliance, US labeling, listing and real profitability, step by step.

For the product side, see also private label and the use cases by trade.

8. Tunisian regulations on the exporter's side

Three guides reserved for operators based in Tunisia.

ONH exporter licence — Legal structure, customs code, specifications, application file and inspection: the path to the licence.
The ONH specifications in detail — Facilities, lot traceability, quality control and commitments, with a pointer to the official version.
Export subsidies: FOPRODEX and Tasdir+ — FOPRODEX for sea and air freight, Tasdir+ for prospecting and trade shows.

Where to start, by profile

Your profile	Start with	Then continue with
Importer or trader	Importing Tunisian olive oil	Customs and agreements, First order
Bottler or packer	IOC and EU standards	Reading a COA, Transport and packaging
Brand in the making, private label or OEM	Launching your brand in OEM	Labeling by market, Retail and private label listing
Organic buyer	Organic EU, USDA, Ecocert	Certifications, Country import sheets
US importer	FDA, FSMA, FSVP	Labeling by market, Amazon FBA USA
Tunisian exporter	ONH licence	EU quota SICAD, Repatriating earnings

The tools that extend these guides

A guide explains the rule; a tool applies it to your case. Our online tools use the same parameters: the calculator builds a landed cost from a FOB price, the COA reader checks a certificate of analysis against the regulatory thresholds, and the comparator puts origins side by side.

Frequently asked questions

Which guide should a first-time importer start with?

Start with Importing Tunisian olive oil, which gives the overview in eight steps, then Succeeding with your first order, which details the sample, the MOQ, the incoterm, payment and receipt. Those two are enough to frame a first shipment; the customs and quality guides come next, depending on your destination market.

Are these guides written for buyers or for exporters?

For both, but not in the same chapters. The sourcing, quality, certification, customs, transport and pricing families are written from the buyer's point of view. The ONH licence, ONH specifications, repatriation of earnings, COTUNACE and FOPRODEX guides concern operators based in Tunisia. Several guides, such as negotiation or payment methods, explicitly set out both sides of the table.

Do these guides replace the official texts?

No. They summarise and put into perspective rules that change: customs duties, tariff quotas, labeling and certification requirements. Each guide points to the applicable official source and must be cross-checked against it before you sign, particularly on customs and food-safety matters.

A question these guides do not cover

If your case does not fit into these thirty-six guides — a destination market that is not covered, a specific customer specification, an unusual packaging format — ask directly: request a quotation describing your project, and we will answer with the relevant regulatory references.