The European Parliament’s rapporteur on geographical indications, Paolo De Castro (S&D, Italian), proposes amending the initial proposal to strengthen the role of producer groups, among other things.
Mr De Castro’s draft report, seen by EUROPE, will be presented to the European Parliament Committee on Agriculture on Tuesday 8 November.
The deadline for the tabling of amendments has been set for 22 November, as the European Parliament Committee on Legal Affairs requested time to give its opinion on the proposal. Final adoption in the Agriculture Committee is expected in spring 2023.
The rapporteur welcomes the objective of the European Commission’s proposal, but believes that it needs to be improved so that the reform results in “strengthening a unique system in the world, capable of creating value without the need to invest any public funds”.
He advocates a strengthening of the role of producer groups, in particular recognised producer groups, while wishing to maintain the national specificities of a system that is working well.
Greater GI protection is introduced for GIs used as ingredients and for GIs protected on the Internet.
Simplification of the GI registration procedure is called for, as well as clarification of the role of the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO). Mr De Castro believes that the agency can be relied upon for certain tasks (protection of GIs on the Internet, opposition procedures, etc.), but that control should remain in the hands of the Commission and the national authorities.
The assessment of the application should generally not exceed 5 months, according to the draft report (six in the proposal).
The rapporteur insists that by 1 January 2026 at the latest, producer groups should draw up a ‘sustainability report’ including a description of the sustainability impacts of the method of obtaining the product, in social, economic, animal health and welfare terms.
Link to the draft report: https://aeur.eu/f/3px (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)