Spain’s Olive Oil Prices have been witnessing a downward trend recently

• Recently, olive oil prices have been sluggish. Producers expected lower output to lift prices at origin, but that jump didn’t happen.
• Even irrigated groves performed poorly, with extraction around 30%, and rain delays paused harvesting in parts of Andalusia, keeping the final crop outcome uncertain.
• By late December 2025, average bulk farmgate prices stayed fairly steady at about €4.20/kg for extra virgin, €3.80/kg for virgin, and €3.50/kg for lampante, with most deals tied to the new-season oil.
• Because Spain is a major global exporter, the market stayed highly sensitive to shifting production expectations driven by prolonged dryness and unusual heat.
• Supermarkets used older inventories to run promotions, keeping retail prices under pressure and limiting how much origin prices could rise.
• Demand improved earlier in 2025 when prices eased, but consumers showed a clear price limit, and Tunisia’s pricing/export situation added competitive pressure that kept buyers cautious.

Spain’s olive oil market ended 2025 in a holding pattern, and that pause carried straight into the first days of January 2026. Producers had gone into the season hoping that lower-than-expected yields would tighten supply enough to lift prices at origin, yet the rebound never really arrived. Even in irrigated groves, where performance is typically more stable, extraction rates averaged close to 30%, and that shortfall fed a sense that the campaign was underdelivering. Rain also disrupted work in many dryland areas and temporarily stopped harvesting in parts of Andalusia, leaving a portion of the crop’s real outcome unresolved while mills and buyers waited for the countryside to restart at full pace after the weather break.

By the final week of December, the most widely watched reference levels at origin were holding steady rather than climbing. Farmgate transactions in bulk oil, sold without packaging, were averaging around €4.20 per kilogram for extra virgin, about €3.80 per kilogram for virgin, and close to €3.50 per kilogram for lampante. Those averages reflected mostly new-season sales, since deals tied to the previous harvest had become scarce once the 2025/26 campaign got underway in the main producing areas. The price ladder between categories still existed, but it felt compressed compared with periods when scarcity or panic buying pushed buyers to pay up more aggressively for higher grades.

Spain’s outsized position in global olive oil trade meant that this lack of lift was never just a local issue. With Andalusia producing the bulk of national volumes and Jaén sitting at the heart of that supply, every shift in harvest expectations had implications for exporters, cooperatives, and the wider rural economy that depends on the crop. The season’s anxiety was also intensified by weather patterns that had already tested groves for months, including a long dry stretch and unusually high temperatures that extended beyond the normal summer window, forcing constant revisions to production assumptions as the harvest progressed.

Retail dynamics also worked against a faster recovery in origin prices. As 2025 closed, large supermarket chains had relied heavily on existing inventories and earlier stocks to run promotions that kept shelf prices under pressure. Those discounts, particularly on large-format bottles, pulled consumer pricing down toward levels that appeared uncomfortably close to farmgate values once costs across processing and distribution were considered. For producers, the message was frustrating: the crop was not proving abundant, yet the downstream market behaved as if there was room to keep prices restrained, reinforcing the sense that origin values were being capped by commercial tactics and cautious buying rather than by genuine oversupply.

Demand inside Spain had shown improvement earlier in 2025 as prices eased from prior highs, and extra virgin regained some momentum in household consumption when the worst of the sticker shock faded. Even so, the market had also revealed a clear ceiling in what many consumers were willing to tolerate, with volumes softening once destination prices moved too far beyond a level that felt acceptable for everyday use. That limit mattered for the entire chain because it influenced how far extra virgin could stretch away from lower grades and how quickly higher prices at origin could be passed through without triggering renewed demand destruction.

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International supply and policy signals added more uncertainty at the same time. Tunisia’s moves to steady its market through mill-level reference pricing and support measures for small farmers and storage had been closely watched, especially because any pricing pressure from Tunisian exports could spill into Mediterranean trade flows. With Tunisian exporters also navigating constraints in certain markets for bulk shipments, the region ended the year aware that competitive supply could still weigh on Spain’s ability to push farmgate prices higher unless scarcity became undeniable.

By early January 2026, what had defined the market most was hesitation. The harvest had already delivered weaker yields than many expected, but rain-disrupted dryland groves in Andalusia had left enough uncertainty to keep buyers cautious. Producers, meanwhile, had been left waiting for the post-holiday return of normal trading to reveal whether the balance of supply and demand would finally tighten in a way that moved prices upward, or whether the campaign would continue with firm numbers that still fell short of what the field conditions had led them to hope for.