Brussels, 28/06/2012 (Agence Europe) - On 20 June, the Council of Ministers of the EU and the European Parliament reached an agreement on the regulation outlining the new quality policy on agricultural products. This compromise does not include the demand made by MEPs that sought to authorise professional groups taking responsibility for Protected Designation of Origin (PDO) and Protected Geographical Indications (PGI) and set up a production management system, in cooperation with their national governments.
The possibility of granting responsibility for PDO and PGI to certain management bodies was strongly opposed by several countries (including Germany, United Kingdom, Poland and the Netherlands). On the other hand, France, Italy and Spain thought the option interesting and underlined that managing deliveries by groups of producers would only involve a small part of production and that a kind of parallel system should be established on the lines of what had been granted to the milk sector. This possibility was not retained, which was regretted by EU agricultural organisations (COPA-COGECA). The Council, however, did make a commitment to discuss the matter within the context of common agricultural policy (CAP) reform. Based on the Commission proposals (dating back to December 2010), a compromise on quality policy was established on 20 June between the EU institutions and approved on 25 June by the Special Committee on Agriculture (SCA). Once it is voted on by the European Parliament during the July or September plenary session, the new regulation can be adopted in the first reading. The main elements in this agreement are as follows:
PDO and PGI. There will be faster registration procedures, the opposition period will be halved. The rules on controls will be clarified, the use of the PDO and PGI logos will become compulsory, better rules for third country GI in bilateral agreements will be created, a legal basis for financing the defence of the EU logo would be established, and the role of producer groups will be better recognised. The demands made by the EP and member states to include cooked dishes in the scope of the PDO and PGI were not included.
Traditional Specialities Guarantee (TSG). This concept will be made more attractive. The scheme will be limited to registration of reserved names, products with similar names but produced with different traditions will be able to be registered and the definition of "traditional" becomes a proven usage on the market during at least 30 years (instead of 25 currently).
New option quality terms. The term, “Mountain product” has been included in the regulation for the first time and is linked to mountain regions as defined in rural development. MEPs insisted that, in future, the inclusion of optional terms being included should be within their remit and that of the Council and not the Commission (delegated acts). This request was dropped in the final compromise. Finally, the Commission is due to present a report on local agriculture and direct sales 12 months at most after the entry into force of the new regulation on quality. (LC/trans/fl)