Uncertainty estimation in the analysis of pesticide residues in olive oil using data from proficiency tests.

In this work we report the results for estimating the measurement uncertainty (MU) following up the application of two different approaches, relatively the top-down procedure, by using proficiency test data. We have focused the estimation on the olive oil matrix. We used the analytical data obtained from five selected editions of the Proficiency Tests (PTs, from 2007 to 2011) on pesticide residues in olive oil to estimate the MU.