09/04/2021

Public consultation on the 'Revision of the EU geographical indications (GIs) systems in agricultural products and foodstuffs, wines and spirit drinks'

The European Union protects almost 3.400 names of specific products - agricultural products and foodstuffs, fishery and aquaculture products, wines, spirit drinks and aromatised wine products - under one of its quality schemes. Among them, the Geographical Indications Scheme, comprising Protected Designations of Origin (PDO), Protected Geographical Indications (PGI) and Geographical indications (GI), confers intellectual property rights, granting the right to producers in a defined geographical area to use the registered name if they comply with a product specification. Alongside the Geographical Indications Scheme, the Traditional Specialities Guaranteed scheme (TSG) attests traditional production methods and can be produced anywhere as long as the producers comply with the corresponding product specification

INSULEUR took an active role in this public consultation launched by the EC which invites citizens, organisations, and national and regional public authorities to contribute to the assessment of how to strengthen geographical indications' system by inviting its members to fill in an online questionnaire (14 questions) in order to include and share their views on the aspects of the upcoming EU proposal for regulation. The aim was to gather views on the major challenges identified that would need to be addressed in the planned revision as well as their underlying causes, the set of policy options that can be envisaged to address these challenges and the impacts stemming from these different options.

The results of the consultation will inform the Impact Assessment, accompanying the Commission proposal for revising the EU geographical indications scheme. To be noted, the Commission has published on 30 November 2020 a Roadmap on the EU-wide protection of geographical indications for non-agricultural products.

The feedback period was open until 09 April 2021 (midnight Brussels time)