Grøntvedt Biotech has become the first herring oil producer to qualify for ORIVO´s origin certification, ensuring pure raw material sourcing. Through independent third-party testing from ORIVO, all the sourced raw material involved in Grøntvedt Biotech´s production, has now been verified as pure herring from the North Atlantic through ORIVO´s unique laboratory testing regime.
Grøntvedt Biotech, part of the well-established Grøntvedt Group, is a manufacturer of high-quality herring oil for human consumption. Strategically located by the Norwegian Northwest coast, the company is able to produce high-quality fish oil from fresh chilled raw materials. With its high content of the valued cetoleic acid, herring oil represents something new in the omega-3 supplement market. This unique feature makes it especially important for the company to document the authenticity of the oil with ORIVO´s services, Hans Ola Hovde, Chief Operating Officer of Grøntvedt Biotech, explains:
“Being a vertically integrated company, we do have excellent traceability of our raw materials. The valued cetoleic acid is limited to quite few species, including Norwegian herring. We therefore want to guarantee that our oil is 100% pure Norwegian herring oil, and not diluted in any form or way – ORIVO’s services based on evidence-based transparency enable us to do so”.
For ORIVO, the enrolment of Grøntvedt Biotech in the program means that yet another species has been added to the verification scheme, ORIVO CTO Erik Fuglseth explains:
“Herring oil for human consumption has until now been available only in very small quantities and has therefore not been very relevant for us to work with. The establishment of Grøntvedt Biotech, however, changed this situation, and we therefore established the chemical fingerprint of North Atlantic herring oil to our database in order to cover what we expect will be a growing need”.
Fuglseth also agrees that products with unique features are particularly well suited for ORIVO´s services:
“Our experience tells us that products with unique features, such as the herring oil, are more exposed to fraud in the marketplace than other, more standard, products. To protect these products, using evidence-based transparency based on laboratory testing is therefore an excellent way of ensuring consumers and brands that they are getting the products they are paying for”.
The product will be formally launched at the upcoming SupplySide West tradeshow in Las Vegas, the largest trade show for professionals in the dietary supplement industry. ORIVO Sales Manager Benedicte Garnes is sure the market will value a novel omega-3 source with verified origin:
“As a company with a passion for origin documentation, we always encourage our clients to look for new and unique ingredient sources. We are therefore glad to see that consumers now are getting access to a brand-new omega-3 source with some interesting additional features to choose from”.
