Lets assume you can make a trainer in exactly the same way as Adidas do, can you stick Adidas on the side?

No, it's a trademark. That's effectively what PGI is, and unlike patents and copyright, trademarks have a direct benefit to the consumer (they know what they are getting. Nobody is stopping people buying a Gutchy handbag, but the selling can't pass it off as Gucci)

Same with "100% Florida orange juice" or "Idaho potatoes". I can buy "Southern Style Whiskey" and that's fine, but if I see "Tennessee whiskey" I am assured it's made in Tennessee. That may be important for me, it may not be, but I have the power.

> Lets assume you can make a trainer in exactly the same way as Adidas do, can you stick Adidas on the side?

I absolutely should. What I obviously shouldn't be allowed to do is claim it's actually made by Adidas.

Because I as a consumer buy more than the sum of the ingredients. I don’t want to buy a product that’s indistinguishable from the product made in the original location. I want to buy the priduct made there.

One reason is that I want to support the production there, as it would be a tragedy if (say) Parmesan producers in Italy were out competed by producers in the US (again, regardless of quality or properties of the product).

What would make that a tragedy? If the production of Parmesan in Italy is an important cultural phenomenon, then it can be preserved using other means, even non-economical ones.

It seems more genuine to have it remain a business/industry and not a museum.

I quite like having genuine Parmesan from the right place. I’m happy to see any amount of ham fisted protectionism to keep it that way too. So to me it’s an easy win.

So all you have to do is look at where it where it was made on the label -- is that too difficult?

Well, yes. Because that’s going to be obfuscated, as it is currently done for things that are not as well protected. Look at standard honey for example. In store I can find: - bottled in the EU (without any other information) - assembled in the EU (from EU and non-EU honeys) - from the EU (whatever that means; the EU is a big place) - “made in xx” (where xx is a small place in a given EU country; the honey itself comes from somewhere else) - no information whatsoever, but with a charming “a EU family company” (actually owned by a multinational).

We know producers are playing fast and loose with labelling. The way to avoid this is regulation, which PGIs are.

> So all you have to do is look at where it where it was made on the label -- is that too difficult?

Apparently yes. Otherwise why would anyone insist on this?

I’m also not at all against seeing the entire new world having to eat “Parmesan style cheese” just to reinforce my own feeling of old-world superiority (I’m half joking, but you get the point of why this may be a thing)

The reason some people insist on this is because they themselves value the provenance (place in this case) where the product was made, and they insist on discounting the opinion of those who care only about the end result.

When Parmesan is only made in Italy, those who care don't have to look at the label, but those who only care about the parmesan part have a hard time tracking under which label the non-Italian version is sold.

It's a question of whose effort is getting discounted.

It's not really a problem in practice. The UK follows EU food labeling rules, at least for now, and so this is a real (not hypothetical) situation.

The easy way is to make it clear through trade dress. Parmesan is normally sold in wedge-shaped plastic trays, in the cheese aisle. So are other grano-type cheeses like Grano Padana. So essentially everything in that packaging is 'parmesan-like'. For the crappy pre-grated stuff in tubs it'll have a label like 'Italian-style hard cheese'.

Same is true of Champagne. The other sparkling wines also come in sparkling wine bottles. And are labeled Cava, Prosecco, Three Choirs Special Reserve, or whatever.

Personally, I much prefer actual parmesan to other (even very similar) Italian cheeses, but am not a fan of most champagnes. So I'd say that the PDO-style accurate labeling was a net positive to me as a consumer, leaving aside the economic protectionism bit.

They insist on this because doing so makes it harder for people who only want the particular style of cheese and don't care where it's made to find any product other than the one that's been given an EU monopoly. For example, for a while Parmesan was a generic name for the style of cheese and Parmigiano-Reggiano was the PDO that people who deeply cared about the origins of their cheese could look for. This wasn't enough for Italian cheese producers, though, so they sued in court to get their PDO extended to Parmesan too. Now the generic version has to be sold as "Italian style hard cheese" and similarly vague, confusing names.

"other than the one that's been given an EU monopoly"

A monopoly is when one company has the exclusive right to sell a product. PDO does not confer monopolies. PDO protects the right to use certain labels.

The USA doesn't respect PDOs. That's fine, if that's what USAians want. That's their business. I want to know what is in my food, and where it comes from; that's my business. I rely on accurate labelling.

This ranting about "EU monopolies" is annoying. It seems to me that it's from people who have never eaten the real thing, can't afford to buy real Roquefort, and resent the europeans for having better food standards than the USA.

They resent the fact that Europeans are trying to control what they call food. Europe can easily add PDO Region/Name or whatever labeling, just like a manufacturing label -- but they'd prefer to try and alter the language to protect their industries... Notice how they're not creating new names, they're trying to reign in generic names.

That's a false dichotomy. It's possible to inject money into local businesses without implementing trademarks. It's possible to create something in an artisanal way, or even as a hobby.

Not everything culturally important needs to turn into an industry, as the existence of local music bands proves. Those don't only play in museums.

Cybernetic again, cheese is more than the sum of its part.

I’m only half joking. Plus, for some recipe the food that the cow ate and the altitude do make a difference in the output.

I’m all for other places making cheese and whatnot.

But when you buy the said cheese to find the exact taste you know since childhood, and that you miss in the exotic land you are living as a adult…

You can be picky on the product. I want the Madeleine de Proust. Not a taste-a-like.

Those labels help me do that. If I want the real deal I will buy it and the label will help me archive that goal. ( not always, see below )

If I feel adventurous, I have nothing against trying other cheeses. Some are good, some might event be identical to the label-cheese. I’m open to that.

Furthermore, and tangentially related … folk should be open to the idea that some produce don’t travel well. They just don’t.

My favorite cheese is embarrassingly bad when I found the official label in the US. The taste is more sauer and the consistency different. It’s just sad.( to eat )

You ignored

> but let's assume that you can make sheep milk in Australia that has the same properties as Greek sheep milk.

As a customer, why would I assume this? It's one thing for an Australian cheese maker to write 'feta' on their product because they think it's similar enough to the Greek cheese and another of it actually being similar.

As a customer the only way to find out would be to buy it and try it out. I don't want to have to go through the fine print on the packaging when all I want is some feta cheese for my greek salad.

For the record, I usually buy Turkish sheep's milk cheese because I like it better than feta cheese, but I very much prefer that those are clearly labelled differently so I can tell them apart.

That’s still just a property of the physical product. That’s just half the story. The important thing is keeping the production in the original region. So I want it to have the competitive advantage of the name. As a consumer I want my money to support the producers in the original location, which is easier if I know that the name means it’s produced there.

Note that zero of these arguments have anything to do with quality or whether I could even distinguish the product from one made elsewhere. That’s secondary.

I thought it was encompass in « more than the sum of its part ». The milk is core, the process is key, the conservation and timing is deceptively important.

You might feed the same breed of cow the same altitude grass, at the same season… and still end up with a different product.

But I see your point, and I think it’s a reasonable one. It’s possible to duplicate a cheese making process and be successful ( or wine: California comes to mind )

But that might be tricky, and maybe i don’t want to be disappointed so I will go with the Geographical indicators label. It’s a safe bet.

A sister response to my earlier comment bring a good point. Sometime you want to patronize a particular region for sentimental reasons.

Valid point. If the conditions in a given region actually make it impossible to replicate Greek Feta – then you just can't make Feta there.

However, it might make sense to allow some leeway to avoid unnecessary shipping. Not very relevant in Macedonia, but if an Australian gets Feta from Greece instead of a local substitute which is close enough for most customers that should be an explicit decision on their part.

In any case, you can still look at the "made in..." label to determine the product's origin.