Geographical Indications Protected in New China-E.U. Trade Deal

Summary

The E.U. and China have reached a trade deal to pro­tect 24 extra vir­gin olive oils from France, Greece, Italy, Portugal, and Spain from imi­ta­tion and com­pe­ti­tion, fol­low­ing 10 years of nego­ti­a­tion. This agree­ment will safe­guard the intel­lec­tual prop­erty rights of these oils, which are esti­mated to be worth over $326 mil­lion annu­ally, and will now go to the European Parliament for for­mal rat­i­fi­ca­tion.

The geo­graph­i­cal indi­ca­tions of 24 extra vir­gin olive oils denom­i­na­tions are set to be for­mally pro­tected against imi­ta­tion by local com­pe­ti­tion and other imports in the European Union’s impend­ing trade deal with China.

Safeguarding the Protected Designation of Origin (PDO) and Protected Geographical Indicator (PGI) sta­tus of the local spe­cial­ties from France, Greece, Italy, Portugal and Spain came after 10 years of nego­ti­a­tion between the two sides.

Overall, there are 127 dif­fer­ent extra vir­gin olive oils with a pro­tected geo­graph­i­cal indi­ca­tion in the E.U., com­ing from seven coun­tries.

According to a recent study by the European Commission, extra vir­gin olive oils with a geo­graph­i­cal indi­ca­tion are worth an esti­mated $326 mil­lion per annum. For the entire agri­cul­tural sec­tor, PDO and PGI prod­ucts are worth more than $80 bil­lion each year.

“The E.U.-China agree­ment will there­fore pro­vide an impor­tant pro­tec­tion of the prod­ucts’ intel­lec­tual prop­erty rights: it will safe­guard against trans­la­tion, tran­scrip­tion or translit­er­a­tion, and against the use of the pro­tected geo­graph­i­cal indi­ca­tions accom­pa­nied by expres­sions such as ​‘kind,’ ​‘type,’ ​‘style,’ ​‘imi­ta­tion’ or the like in respect of a non-orig­i­nat­ing prod­uct,” the Council of the European Union said in a state­ment.

Having passed through the coun­cil of 27 E.U. trade min­is­ters, the deal will now go to the European Parliament, where it is expected to be for­mally rat­i­fied later in the year.

The fol­low­ing PDO and PGI olive oils were included in the agree­ment:

• Council of the European Union