The pretreatment of crude olive mill waste-waters (OMW) with the white rot fungus Phanerochaete chrysosporium decreased the chemical oxygen demand (COD) from 107 to 55 g/l. The subsequent anaerobic digestion of this prefermented OMW showed an inhibition of the biomethanation, even at low hydrolic loadings. The toxicity of the pretreated OMW could be due to the concentrations of high molecular weight aromatics which remained high after the fungal treatment step. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. Al rights reserved.