(1) Excellent title. "Feta accompli: Denmark loses Greek cheese fight at top EU court" (in the article itself) isn't bad either. Love it. Though you shouldn't overdo it, as the puns are quite...
(1) Excellent title. "Feta accompli: Denmark loses Greek cheese fight at top EU court" (in the article itself) isn't bad either. Love it. Though you shouldn't overdo it, as the puns are quite cheesy already.
(2) The judgement seems alright to me, I wouldn't have expected otherwise. From a pro-european perspective, I think it's beneficial if the EU appears as one entity with one common set of rules on the international stage.
(3) But: I can't help but wonder what the point is with protected designations of origin. I'm not exactly a fan. I'm all for protecting the consumer from products that claim to be something they're not. But when I buy Feta or Schwarzwald ham, or Parmesan, I expect a product that was created to a standard of quality, maybe according to a specific process. I don't necessarily expect a specific origin. Basically, if it doesn't affect me as a consumer, why protect me from it? But of course, these protections are there to protect jobs and companies, not consumers. I'm just not sure this is the right way to do it. If we want to help out the struggling economies of the EU, do that explictly and directly, and leave the market and consumer protection alone.
You can buy it, under a different name. Champagne vs sparkling wine. It's akin to a patent - that region created the thing, they spent time building a reputation, marketing, etc. It's not fair to...
You can buy it, under a different name. Champagne vs sparkling wine.
It's akin to a patent - that region created the thing, they spent time building a reputation, marketing, etc. It's not fair to those people that invested all that effort for Nestlé to open a factory to mass produce some knockoff that capitalizes on the name. It dilutes the "brand" the region established and there's no accountability.
If Nestlé wants to call it, say, Parmesan cheese, then they're allowed to do it if they open the factory in Parma, but then they're subject to the laws in the locality and that locality can then enforce whatever food purity laws or whatever else they want.
Go look at Greek yogurt for example. It's supposed to be yogurt that strains out the whey/liquid. It's thick because it's concentrated. Or, it's supposed to be. Fage, Oikos, etc. are made with milk and yogurt cultures. They get it thick by traditional processing.
Yoplait Greek yogurt is using gelatin to artificially thicken the yogurt, Greek Gods is using pectin, Zoi is using maltodextrin, etc.
If there were protections here then you could buy "Greek yogurt" that's manufactured how you expect when you hear the name, or "Greek-style yogurt" for those that aren't.
I mean, you're mixing up the two things that I separated explicitly. I have no qualms about limiting the valid processes to achieve a product. Let's stick with greek yogurt because it's a good...
I mean, you're mixing up the two things that I separated explicitly.
I have no qualms about limiting the valid processes to achieve a product. Let's stick with greek yogurt because it's a good example. I have absolutely no problem with limiting the ingredients to achieve a certain standard of consumer-detectable outcomes. That's entirely fine. We do it all the time. Wiener Schnitzel is veal, Schitzel Vienna style is pork. Fine, all fine.
The issues I have is when we (1) mix consumer protection with trade protection and/or (2) do consumer protection around issues that are irrelevant to the consumer. (1) is bad for admittedly dogmatic reasons: I don't like a law that claims to be one thing to be about an entirely different thing. Some amount of trade protection is good, just don't sell it as consumer protection. On (2), I just don't think the consumer cares where the product comes from, as long as it's made to the same standard. Unless they want to protect those economies, in which case they can buy it from there. You could argue that that's exactly the difference between greek-style yoghurt and greek yoghurt. But I feel there's a decision being made (from above) about the things the consumer can do: "Off-brand" greek-style yoghurt is quite disadvantaged here, even if it's properly made.
(Please ignore that afaict Greek Yoghurt isn't actually a geographic designation like Parmesan. Humor the example.)
There's also an ecological problem about supply chain length here. Maybe I want my cheese to be made to Parmesan specifications, but don't want it to be shipped in from italy because that's just wasteful. What options do I have? Buy "italian style hard cheese" and hope it's a decent product?
In short, I don't think there's anything special about a region that deserves what essentially amounts to IP protections. Why? Because that region didn't invent it; someone or a group of people in that region invented it, and by all likelihood they're long dead. This isn't an issue of rewarding inventions and creativity. I think that's also apparent when looking at the way these laws work: This isn't a non-specific IP law that grants a bunch of exclusive rights to a bunch of regions; afair, these are crafted individually for each region. If I, as a person, want to protect my invention (so it be protectable), I go to a patent office and file a patent. There's a law somewhere that regulates what is patentable and how that process works, and a paper pusher stamps my form. No lawmakers involved. If I'm a region with a food product? I lobby lawmakers to craft a piece of legislation for just my product. For maybe also somewhat dogmatic reasons: That process stinks.
Edit: I suppose also it pays to distinguish between foods where the regional distinction is synonymous with the product itself, and foods where it's a distinction of quality, while the generic name is intact and well-known.
(1) Excellent title. "Feta accompli: Denmark loses Greek cheese fight at top EU court" (in the article itself) isn't bad either. Love it. Though you shouldn't overdo it, as the puns are quite cheesy already.
(2) The judgement seems alright to me, I wouldn't have expected otherwise. From a pro-european perspective, I think it's beneficial if the EU appears as one entity with one common set of rules on the international stage.
(3) But: I can't help but wonder what the point is with protected designations of origin. I'm not exactly a fan. I'm all for protecting the consumer from products that claim to be something they're not. But when I buy Feta or Schwarzwald ham, or Parmesan, I expect a product that was created to a standard of quality, maybe according to a specific process. I don't necessarily expect a specific origin. Basically, if it doesn't affect me as a consumer, why protect me from it? But of course, these protections are there to protect jobs and companies, not consumers. I'm just not sure this is the right way to do it. If we want to help out the struggling economies of the EU, do that explictly and directly, and leave the market and consumer protection alone.
You can buy it, under a different name. Champagne vs sparkling wine.
It's akin to a patent - that region created the thing, they spent time building a reputation, marketing, etc. It's not fair to those people that invested all that effort for Nestlé to open a factory to mass produce some knockoff that capitalizes on the name. It dilutes the "brand" the region established and there's no accountability.
If Nestlé wants to call it, say, Parmesan cheese, then they're allowed to do it if they open the factory in Parma, but then they're subject to the laws in the locality and that locality can then enforce whatever food purity laws or whatever else they want.
Go look at Greek yogurt for example. It's supposed to be yogurt that strains out the whey/liquid. It's thick because it's concentrated. Or, it's supposed to be. Fage, Oikos, etc. are made with milk and yogurt cultures. They get it thick by traditional processing.
Yoplait Greek yogurt is using gelatin to artificially thicken the yogurt, Greek Gods is using pectin, Zoi is using maltodextrin, etc.
If there were protections here then you could buy "Greek yogurt" that's manufactured how you expect when you hear the name, or "Greek-style yogurt" for those that aren't.
I mean, you're mixing up the two things that I separated explicitly.
I have no qualms about limiting the valid processes to achieve a product. Let's stick with greek yogurt because it's a good example. I have absolutely no problem with limiting the ingredients to achieve a certain standard of consumer-detectable outcomes. That's entirely fine. We do it all the time. Wiener Schnitzel is veal, Schitzel Vienna style is pork. Fine, all fine.
The issues I have is when we (1) mix consumer protection with trade protection and/or (2) do consumer protection around issues that are irrelevant to the consumer. (1) is bad for admittedly dogmatic reasons: I don't like a law that claims to be one thing to be about an entirely different thing. Some amount of trade protection is good, just don't sell it as consumer protection. On (2), I just don't think the consumer cares where the product comes from, as long as it's made to the same standard. Unless they want to protect those economies, in which case they can buy it from there. You could argue that that's exactly the difference between greek-style yoghurt and greek yoghurt. But I feel there's a decision being made (from above) about the things the consumer can do: "Off-brand" greek-style yoghurt is quite disadvantaged here, even if it's properly made.
(Please ignore that afaict Greek Yoghurt isn't actually a geographic designation like Parmesan. Humor the example.)
There's also an ecological problem about supply chain length here. Maybe I want my cheese to be made to Parmesan specifications, but don't want it to be shipped in from italy because that's just wasteful. What options do I have? Buy "italian style hard cheese" and hope it's a decent product?
In short, I don't think there's anything special about a region that deserves what essentially amounts to IP protections. Why? Because that region didn't invent it; someone or a group of people in that region invented it, and by all likelihood they're long dead. This isn't an issue of rewarding inventions and creativity. I think that's also apparent when looking at the way these laws work: This isn't a non-specific IP law that grants a bunch of exclusive rights to a bunch of regions; afair, these are crafted individually for each region. If I, as a person, want to protect my invention (so it be protectable), I go to a patent office and file a patent. There's a law somewhere that regulates what is patentable and how that process works, and a paper pusher stamps my form. No lawmakers involved. If I'm a region with a food product? I lobby lawmakers to craft a piece of legislation for just my product. For maybe also somewhat dogmatic reasons: That process stinks.
Edit: I suppose also it pays to distinguish between foods where the regional distinction is synonymous with the product itself, and foods where it's a distinction of quality, while the generic name is intact and well-known.