On Wednesday 2 July, the European Commission adopted a regulation on the registration of the ‘TOKAJSKÉ VÍNO zo slovenskej oblasti’ designation of origin in the Union register of protected geographical indications (PGI). This product refers to the Slovak ‘Tokaj’ wine.
The regulation, published in the Official Journal of the EU on Thursday 3 July (https://aeur.eu/f/hp2 ), refutes the arguments of Hungary, which was opposed to this PGI to protect its ‘Tokaj’. “None of the arguments raised by Hungary gives grounds for the rejection of the application for registration. Accordingly, [this] designation of origin [...] should be entered in the Union register of geographical indications”, according to the regulation.
The Commission considers that, given local and traditional usage and the absence of any risk of confusion, the partial homonymy does not prevent the name in question from being registered.
As regards Hungary’s argument that the geographical area of ‘TOKAJSKÉ VÍNO zo slovenskej oblasti’ does not correspond to the Tokaj region as historically defined, the Commission notes that while Hungarian and Slovak Tokaj wines share a common winegrowing history, Tokaj wines are now produced in two distinct geographical areas in two different Member States.
The geographical area of ‘TOKAJSKÉ VÍNO zo slovenskej oblasti’ includes seven Slovak municipalities. “Wine regions may evolve over time and their territorial limits may shift compared to how they were centuries ago, without however questioning the authenticity of the place of origin”, writes the Commission. (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)