Europe’s trade-marks. Protecting names

Date: 02/08/03

The European Union's list of sacrosanct trade names may not fend off imitators

WHAT'S in a name? For Europe's farmers the short answer is money. The European Union is preparing a list of some 35 different foods and wines which it wants protected by the World Trade Organisation. If the EU gets its way, American producers will no longer be able to call their sparkling wines “champagne”: that name will be reserved for producers from the Champagne region of France; “parma ham” will actually have to come from around Parma, in Italy; sherry from near Jerez in southern Spain; and so on - and on.

The EU says that its campaign for “geographic indicators” is all about quality assurance and consumer protection. It argues that if European farmers are to be weaned off their trade-distorting subsidies, they must be encouraged to become niche producers focusing on quality rather than quantity. Protecting the names of traditional European products is, they argue, crucial to this endeavour. It also ensures that consumers will not be fobbed off with inferior imitations.

Nonsense, respond furious farmers and trade negotiators from North America and Australia. “Geographic indicators” (GIs), they say, are just a new form of protectionism. European immigrants to the new world brought things like Cheddar cheese and Gorgonzola with them, and they have become generic terms. Besides, the whole process risks absurdity. Will the Europeans one day insist that frankfurters can only be made in Frankfurt?

Both sides of the argument may be missing the point. For the evidence suggests that GIs can anyway be counter-productive. A bilateral agreement between Australia and the EU in 1994 saw the Australians agree to stop using the names of French regions like Burgundy or Chablis to describe their wines. The deal was the making of the Australian wine industry. Relying on their own regional names like Coonawarra and Barossa, and stressing grape varieties like Chardonnay and Shiraz, the Australians have built the world's most dynamic wine industry. This year, for the first time ever, Australian wines will outsell the French in both Britain and the United States.

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