The geographical indications on the table this summer

What are geographical indications (GIs) and why do they matter? Inspired by his summer barbecue, Matteo Mariano explores some of the GIs that protect food and drinks.

When you buy groceries to prepare your barbecue and impress your friends, you will likely encounter a range of food and drinks in the supermarket with a similar logo on their packaging. This logo shows that the name of the product is a protected geographical indication (PGI or GI) or a protected denomination of origin (PDO).

What are geographical indications?

These PGI and PDO registrations aim to guarantee the geographical origin of products, i.e., to indicate that they have been produced in a specific area, according to a specific set of rules and requirements, and combining the intrinsic qualities of the raw materials, the environment and the know-how of artisans.

More specifically:

• A PGI aims to guarantee that a product originates in a specific place, region or country, and that a given quality, reputation or other characteristic is essentially attributable to the geographical origin. At least one of the production steps must occur in the defined geographical area. This type of protection can be given to foodstuffs, wines, and craft and industrial products.
• A PDO aims to guarantee that a product originates from a specific place, region or country, and that its quality or characteristics are essentially or exclusively due to a particular geographical environment with its inherent natural and human factors. All production steps must take place in the defined geographical area. This type of protection can only be given to foodstuffs or wines.

Products that do not fulfil those requirements cannot be called by the name protected by that geographical indication.

Europe’s food and wine heritage has many ties to geographical indications. These have long been governed by EU rules, which were recently revamped by Regulation 2024/1143 of 11 April 2024. Geographical indications on craft and industrial products have thus far been a national story, but will be entirely governed by EU rules now that Regulation 2023/2411 of 18 October 2023 will start applying on 1 December 2025.

What types of products do PGI and PDO rights protect?

To get an idea of the types of products protected by PGI and PDO rights, let’s go back to our barbecue.

• A sparkling tipple

Let’s say you would like to welcome your guests with a delicate, fresh glass of sparkling wine. The obvious option will be Champagne, a product famously linked to its geographical area of provenance in the Champagne region in France and protected by a PDO.  

The Champagne PDO allows the name to be used only for rosé or white sparkling wine produced according to a certain methodology and using certain grape varieties (Pinot Noir, Pinot Meunier, Chardonnay) in an area defined by the French departments of Aisne, Aube, Haute-Marne, Marne and Seine-et-Marne. No other product in the world can be named Champagne if it is not produced according to the specifications imposed by the Comité Champagne (French Champagne Committee).  

And even if a product is compliant with that specification, beware: a trademark that contains another term that might mislead the public cannot be registered. In a recent case, for example, the Court of Justice of the European Union found the NERO CHAMPAGNE mark to be misleading because consumers could think it is red wine or exclusively made of Pinot grapes, which is not in line with the specifications. As you can see, the protection of geographical indications is very broad.

• A refreshing salad

As a starter, you might want to offer a fresh tomato salad with a drizzle of olive oil. At the supermarket, many cherry tomato varieties are available, but few are typical of a specific place. An exception here is the Pomodoro di Pachino, a type of tomato grown in the Sicilian boroughs of Pachino, Portopalo di Capo Passero, and some parts of Noto and Ispica. Tomatoes can only be called Pomodoro di Pachino if they originate from this area, and production rules also include the use of groundwater taken from local wells! This EU protected geographical indication (PGI) dates back to 2003. But what would a tomato salad be without an excellent olive oil? Southern Europe is full of it. For instance, Kalamata olive oil exclusively comes from the Greek municipality of Kalamata and must be made from the Koroneiki and Mastoidis olive varieties. Its protection as a PDO in the EU goes back to 1997.

• An array of barbecued delights

Once you fire up the grill, what better way is there to test the temperature than by slicing up some Halloumi and marking it to reach that melty and chewy texture we all love? Halloumi is also protected by a PDO and produced in Cyprus – specifically, the districts of Nicosia, Limassol, Larnaca, Famagusta, Paphos and Kyrenia. Halloumi can be fresh (the one we grill) or mature. It must be made from sheep or goat’s milk (or a mixture), although it can contain cow’s milk – of course, it must be Cypriot milk, from local breeds. The specification includes specific requirements for fat and salt content, related to the feed given to the animals providing the milk. In addition, all production steps must occur within the defined geographic area.  

Protecting Halloumi as a PDO was not a walk in the park, however. Initially, the cheese was protected by a collective mark, but its enforcement turned out to be very difficult. Cyprus then filed for a PDO in 2009, but had to wait until April 2021 before Halloumi was granted protection as a PDO at the EU level.  

Moving on to the main course, you might have an eye for a nice ribeye grilled medium-rare. Well, even in terms of meat, the EU GI system has something in store. Irish Grass Fed Beef is a PGI, protected at the EU level since November 2023. The specification requires the meat to have certain characteristics, such as an even distribution of fat as intramuscular marbling, a pronounced cherry-red colour, and a high degree of yellowness of the fat. To qualify as “grass-fed”, the cattle must be fed at least 90% grass, which must be primarily grazed grass. This is also why cattle must spend a certain number of days per year grazing pasture. The specific steps to be taken in the geographical area cover the cattle being born, raised on grass, finished, slaughtered, chilled and quartered. This must all happen on the island of Ireland (both Ireland and Northern Ireland).  

• A hearty accompaniment

What to drink alongside the rich, meaty flavour of Irish Grass Fed Beef? Options are plentiful. You could go for a Primitivo di Manduria, a red wine from the Italian region of Puglia, registered as PDO at the EU level in 2009. Only red wines made out of Primitivo grapes from a selected number of boroughs in the provinces of Taranto and Brindisi can truly call themselves a Primitivo di Manduria PDO. However, many wines carry that label in the supermarket, so producers must rely on trademarks alongside the PDO mention and logo to distinguish themselves. These trademarks must be distinctive to be protected – if a trademark contains a PDO as an element, it must nevertheless have other elements that bring distinctive character to the mark as a whole. Recently, a trademark composed of the words PRIMITIVO DI MANDURIA – SINCE 1974 was cancelled because the reference to a year would be understood by the consumer as mere promotional information about the wine’s longstanding quality.  

In any event, beware if you consider Primitivo: among the requirements mentioned in the specification, the alcohol content must be at least 13.5°.  

• A sweet treat

To cap off your delicious barbecue, you might want to end on a sweet and crunchy note. Here, you could turn to Turrón de Alicante, protected as PGI in the EU since 1996. This nougat sweet, consisting of almonds, pure honey, sugar, egg white and wafer, must be produced in the municipality of Jijona in the Alicante province. However, raw materials can come from Alicante, Castellón, and Valencia.  

From starter to dessert, passing through wine, geographical indications are all around in European food, but trademarks also have a critical role to play.  

If you’d like to know more about the impact of PGI and PDO rights on intellectual property strategy, sign up to our monthly IP newsletter to receive future articles about geographical indications and trademarks, speak to your Novagraaf attorney or contact us below.

Matteo Mariano is a Trademark and Design Attorney at Novagraaf in Brussels.