Rawya Black Seed Oil: Who Makes It and What They Publish
If you have gone looking for Rawya black seed oil, you will have noticed something odd about the results: nearly all of them are shops. Amazon, eBay, OnBuy, a couple of health-food sites. There is very little that simply tells you who makes the oil, where the seed is grown, or what the brand itself publishes about what is in the bottle. That gap is worth closing, because Rawya is a real product with a real manufacturer behind it, and some of what it publishes is genuinely good. Some of what it does not publish matters more. What follows uses only what Rawya and its manufacturer say in their own words.
For our own oil, see our cold-pressed Ethiopian black seed oil.
The Short Answer
- Rawya is a Turkish black seed oil. The brand has no standalone website of its own — its product pages sit on the retailer Berrilys, and the manufacturer of record is Farmeks Tarım Ürünleri, a family firm in İzmir.
- Rawya states plainly that the seed is Turkish, that the oil is cold-pressed, unrefined and single-ingredient, and that it is bottled in glass. All of that is published in the brand's own words.
- Rawya sells an unfiltered version alongside its other bottles, and labels that one explicitly as unfiltered. Offering the choice openly is a genuinely useful thing to do, and not many brands bother. The other bottles carry no filtration label at all, so their filtered status is an inference rather than something the brand states.
- The organic claim is substantive. The manufacturer states the oil is certified organic to EU and NOP/USDA standards and produced in a BRC-certified facility.
- Rawya publishes no thymoquinone percentage. Its own pages promise the "maximum Thymoquinone (TQ) concentration available", while the manufacturer's technical page lists a full fatty-acid profile and no thymoquinone line at all.
- An organic certificate and a certificate of analysis answer different questions. The first is about how the seed was grown; the second is about what is measurably in the oil. A brand can hold one and not the other.
- Sidr & Stone publishes the second kind: 2.67% thymoquinone, independently verified per batch by Analytice, an ISO-accredited French laboratory, with a Certificate of Analysis you can look at.
Who Actually Makes Rawya Black Seed Oil
Rawya does not have a shopfront of its own. Search for a rawya.com or a rawya.co.uk and you will find nothing. The brand's own product copy — written in the first person, "at Rawya we are committed to" — lives on Berrilys, a retailer that carries the full Rawya Nutrition line.
The manufacturer named on the product data is Farmeks Tarım Ürünleri, based in the Aegean Free Zone at Gaziemir, İzmir. Farmeks describes itself as a family business founded in 2008 operating a 12,000 square metre facility, and it presses a range of seed and kernel oils on a business-to-business basis, of which black seed oil is one.
None of that is a criticism. A great many supplement brands are marketing companies sitting on top of a contract manufacturer, and Farmeks is a real, named, findable factory with a published address and telephone number. That is more than a lot of brands will give you. But it is worth knowing, because when you ask a question about Rawya's oil, the answer usually lives on the manufacturer's technical page rather than the brand's.
What Rawya Publishes About the Seed, the Pressing and the Bottle
On the substance of the product, Rawya is reasonably forthcoming. In its own words the seed is Turkish: "Our black seed oil hails from the heart of Turkey." Farmeks corroborates it with a plain "Origin: Turkey" on its specification page. No region, farm or harvest year is given, but the country-level claim is the brand's own and it is consistent across both sites.
Turkey is a serious black cumin producer with a long agricultural history, and origin is a reasonable thing for a brand to lead with. It is worth being clear about what origin does and does not tell you, though — a subject we cover in more depth in our guide to Turkish black seed oil. Country of origin describes where a plant grew. It does not describe what came out of the press.
The processing claims are straightforward: cold-pressed, unrefined, no additives or preservatives, single ingredient, glass bottle. No pressing temperature is stated anywhere. The range as the brand itself publishes it looks like this — with the filtration column recording what each product page actually says, rather than what a reader can reasonably infer from it.
| Product | Size | Filtration as labelled by the brand | Thymoquinone figure published? |
|---|---|---|---|
| Organic Black Seed Oil | 250 ml | Not labelled — filtered by implication | No |
| Organic Unfiltered Black Seed Oil | 250 ml | Unfiltered — stated explicitly | No |
| Organic Mild Black Seed Oil | 100 ml | Not labelled — filtered by implication | No |
| Organic Strong Black Seed Oil | 100 ml | Not labelled — filtered by implication | No |
| Soft-Gel Capsules | 120 × 500 mg | n/a | No |
The "mild" and "strong" 100ml pair is positioned on taste and potency — mild is described as balancing potency and flavour, strong as "maximum potency, minimum consumption". Neither carries a number, so a reader cannot tell how much stronger "strong" is, or than what.
Filtered or Unfiltered: a Choice Worth Crediting
One thing Rawya does that deserves plain credit: it sells an unfiltered version of the oil and labels it as such, in a category where most brands do not offer the choice at all. The unfiltered product page names itself unfiltered, contrasts the bottle with "traditional filtered oils", and describes it as containing black seed particles. That is honest labelling of a real difference.
It is worth being precise about the limit of it, though. Only the unfiltered bottle carries a filtration label. The standard 250 ml, the mild and the strong say nothing about filtration either way, so a reader works out that they are filtered from the contrast the unfiltered page draws, rather than reading it stated on those pages. That is a reasonable inference, and almost certainly the right one — it is simply not published labelling, and we would rather describe it as what it is.
Filtration is a cosmetic decision more than a quality one. An unfiltered cold-pressed oil carries fine seed sediment that settles at the bottom of the bottle and can look like a fault to someone who has not seen it before. Filtering removes it and gives a brighter-looking oil. Neither is wrong; they are different preferences.
Sidr & Stone's oil is unfiltered, for what it is worth, and we say so for the same reason — a reader who tips the bottle and sees fine sediment should know in advance that this is what an unrefined pressed oil looks like, not a sign that something has gone wrong.
The Organic Certification Is Real — and It Answers a Different Question
This is where Rawya has a genuine advantage over us, and we are not going to soften it. Farmeks states on its own site that its black seed oil is "certified organic according to EU and NOP/USDA standards" and processed in a BRC-certified facility, and it describes its plant as BRC A grade. An independent organic trade directory also lists a named European certification body against the company. That is a real certification chain with a real auditor behind it.
Sidr & Stone's seed is organically grown — no synthetic pesticides or fertilisers — but we do not hold formal organic certification, because it is genuinely difficult to obtain in the Ethiopian highlands where our seed is grown. We would rather describe our sourcing accurately than claim a certificate we do not have. If formal organic certification is the thing you care most about, Rawya can show you something we cannot.
The one qualification worth making is documentary rather than substantive. Neither Rawya's product pages nor the manufacturer's certificates page publishes the organic certificate itself, a certifier name or a certificate number. The claim is almost certainly sound; it is simply not something a buyer can check from the page they are reading.
And an organic certificate answers a narrower question than most buyers assume.
| The question | Organic certification | Certificate of analysis |
|---|---|---|
| How was the crop grown? | Yes — this is exactly what it certifies | No |
| Were synthetic pesticides used? | Yes | No |
| How much thymoquinone is in this oil? | No | Yes — this is exactly what it measures |
| Was the pressing hot or cold? | Not directly | Not directly, but oxidation markers hint at it |
| Does it describe this specific batch? | No — it certifies the system | Yes, when issued per batch |
Both documents are worth having. They are just not substitutes for one another, and a brand that shows you one is not thereby answering the other.
What "Maximum Thymoquinone" Actually Commits To
Thymoquinone is the compound most of the published research on Nigella sativa is built around, and it is the reason anyone compares black seed oils at all. Rawya markets on it. Its own pages say the oil "boasts an exceptional level of potency, ensuring you receive the maximum Thymoquinone (TQ) concentration available", and the capsule page repeats the phrase.
What it does not do is put a number to it. There is no percentage on Rawya's own pages, no certificate of analysis, no batch testing and no lot-level reporting anywhere we could find. A single Amazon listing title in the United States carries the words "High TQ 2%", but that figure appears nowhere else — not in the bullets, not on the brand's pages, not tied to any batch or date.
The detail that stayed with us while reading for this article was on the manufacturer's own specification page. Farmeks publishes a full fatty-acid profile for its black seed oil, with declared ranges for palmitic, stearic, oleic, linoleic, linolenic and arachidic acid. It is a properly detailed technical sheet. There is no thymoquinone line on it at all. The compound the brand sells on is the one compound the spec sheet does not measure.
"Maximum available" is not a falsifiable claim. It cannot be wrong, because it is not a quantity. A measured per-batch figure can be wrong, which is precisely what makes it useful — someone tested a specific bottle's batch and published what came back. If you want the longer version of why this distinction matters more than the headline number, we have written about the highest thymoquinone claims in the category and about what thymoquinone actually is.
| Specification | Rawya | Sidr & Stone |
|---|---|---|
| Seed origin stated | Turkey | Ethiopian highlands |
| Pressing | Cold-pressed, temperature not stated | Cold-pressed below 40°C |
| Refining | Unrefined | Unrefined |
| Filtration | Unfiltered version offered and labelled; other bottles carry no filtration label | Unfiltered |
| Ingredients | Single ingredient | Single ingredient |
| Organic status | Certified organic (EU / NOP scope) | Organically grown, not certified |
| Thymoquinone figure | None published | 2.67% |
| Per-batch certificate of analysis | None published | Yes, published |
| Testing laboratory | Not stated | Analytice, ISO-accredited, France |
Three Fair Objections to All of This
"Does the thymoquinone number actually matter, or is it just a metric brands compete on?" A fair challenge. Thymoquinone is not the only active constituent, and no percentage on a label predicts what a supplement will do for any individual. What the number does tell you is whether the oil was pressed and stored in a way that preserved a heat-sensitive and light-sensitive compound. It is a proxy for process, not a promise of outcome.
"Rawya is certified organic and you are not. Isn't that the more meaningful certificate?" For some buyers, yes — and we said so above rather than burying it. Organic certification is an audited, externally verified standard covering how a crop is grown. Our answer is not that it does not matter; it is that it answers a different question from the one a thymoquinone buyer is asking, and we have chosen to answer the second one.
"You sell black seed oil. Why should we trust your read on a competitor?" Also fair. Everything above is sourced to Rawya's own pages and its manufacturer's own technical sheet, so you can check it. Where Rawya is better than us we have said so. The one thing we would ask you not to take on trust is our own figure — which is why we publish the certificate.
Why Sidr & Stone
The argument this article makes is that a brand should publish the number it markets on. That is a standard we have to meet ourselves before we can reasonably ask it of anyone else, and it is the reason our oil is built the way it is.
- Independently verified 2.67% thymoquinone, tested per batch
- Tested by Analytice, an ISO-accredited French laboratory
- Organically grown Ethiopian highland Nigella sativa — chosen after a 36-supplier evaluation
- Cold-pressed below 40°C to protect the heat-sensitive thymoquinone
- 100% pure — a single ingredient, nothing added
- Unrefined, which preserves the oil's natural integrity
- Bottled in matte black UV-protective glass
- Halal certified
- 10% of profits to charity
- Fulfilment in the UK, EU, and US
That 36-supplier evaluation is the part that shaped everything else. Samples were tested rather than trusted, and highland Ethiopian seed came back consistently highest on thymoquinone. We will not tell you Sidr & Stone is the strongest or the best — that would be the very kind of claim this article is arguing against. What we will say is that our figure is 2.67%, independently verified per batch, and the evidence is there to see.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is Rawya black seed oil?
Rawya is a brand of cold-pressed, unrefined Turkish black seed oil sold mainly through online marketplaces. Its own product pages sit on the retailer Berrilys, and the manufacturer of record is Farmeks Tarım Ürünleri in İzmir, Turkey.
Where is Rawya black seed oil made?
Turkey. The brand states the seed is Turkish and the manufacturer's specification page gives the origin as Turkey. No region, farm or harvest year is published.
Is Rawya black seed oil certified organic?
The manufacturer states it is certified organic to EU and NOP/USDA standards and produced in a BRC-certified facility. That is a real certification chain, and a genuine strength. The certificate itself, and the certifier's name and number, are not published on the brand's or the manufacturer's pages.
Does Rawya publish a thymoquinone percentage?
No. Rawya's own pages describe the "maximum Thymoquinone (TQ) concentration available" without giving a figure, and the manufacturer's technical sheet lists a full fatty-acid profile with no thymoquinone line. A single overseas marketplace listing title mentions 2%, but that number appears nowhere else and is not tied to a batch.
What is the difference between Rawya's mild and strong black seed oil?
The brand positions mild as a balance of potency and flavour, and strong as maximum potency for a smaller dose. Neither is described with a measured figure, so the difference is presented in terms of taste and intensity rather than a quantity you can compare.
Should I choose a filtered or an unfiltered black seed oil?
It is largely a matter of preference. Unfiltered oil keeps the fine seed sediment that settles at the bottom of the bottle; filtered oil looks clearer. Neither is a sign of better or worse quality. Rawya offers an unfiltered version and labels it explicitly, which is helpful — though its other bottles carry no filtration label, so their filtered status is an inference rather than something the brand states.
Where can you buy Rawya black seed oil?
Mostly through online marketplaces — Amazon, eBay, OnBuy and similar — plus the Berrilys site that carries the brand's own product pages. There is no direct Rawya storefront.
Is black seed oil a medicine?
No. Black seed oil is a food supplement, not a medicine. It has a long traditional history and an interesting body of research around thymoquinone, and can be a worthwhile part of a healthy routine — but it does not cure diseases and is not a substitute for medical care. Be cautious of any black seed oil marketed with specific disease-cure claims.
Final Thoughts
Rawya is a more transparent brand than the search results suggest. It names its country of origin, describes its processing plainly, offers an unfiltered version and labels it explicitly, and stands behind an organic certification with a real auditor and a real facility standard. Read against the marketplace average, that is a respectable specification, and a reader who ends up with a bottle of it has not made a poor decision.
The gap is narrow and specific. For a brand that markets on thymoquinone, there is no thymoquinone number — not on its own pages, not on its manufacturer's otherwise detailed spec sheet, and not in any published certificate of analysis. "Maximum available" is a description of intent. It is not a measurement, and it cannot be checked.
That is the only question we would put to any black seed oil, ours included: what does the bottle in front of you actually contain, and who measured it? If you want a fuller walkthrough of how to judge that for yourself, see our guide to choosing a high quality black seed oil.
Our cold-pressed Ethiopian black seed oil — independently verified at 2.67% thymoquinone — is available now, with fulfilment in the UK, EU, and US.
Shop Sidr & Stone Cold-Pressed Ethiopian Black Seed Oil — Verified 2.67% Thymoquinone →
Disclaimer: This article describes Rawya's published product information, and that of its manufacturer, as stated on their own pages at the time of writing; specifications and brand practices may change, and readers should check current sources. Comparisons are made in good faith and in fair terms. Black seed oil is a food supplement, not a medicine, and is not a substitute for medical treatment of any condition. For any health concern, consult a qualified medical professional.