Food: Olive oil : Brussels proposes origin labelling

In Brussels the European Commission has proposed the compulsory origin labelling of the olive oil, virgin and extra virgin. This proposal was particularly expected in Italy, because it will solve the actual struggle on the national legislation, that since last January has obliged to use the denomination “Italian oil” only where the olives used are from Italy. The EU law , instead, imposes that the origin label is facultative for the oils not belonging to the protected denominations PDO or PGI. On 28th February Brussels a legal procedure against Italy had started. Anyway, in the last months , the EU minister for Agriculture Mariann Fisher Boel, had shown her availability to solve the question with Rome, assuring a careful analysis of the EU Commission on our documents, defending the reasons of EU quality producers and consumers. Fischer Boel had known that it would be difficult to let the public opinion understand the Commission’s diktat obliging to define as “ Italian” an olive oil produced in Italian olive-mills, but with olives coming from Tunisia and Spain. So the Commission decided to come back from the legal procedure against Italy. In fact the new proposal basically puts the Italian standard as the European labelling range. The indication of origin on the label, that will be compulsory all over the EU, will allow to name the country of origin only if the oil all comes from the country itself. The mixtures of oils coming from different countries will be labelled as “ Mixture of communitarian olive oil ”or “ non-communitarian “ , or similar indications.
Today the proposal has been presented to the member-states, which should approve it within the end of the year, after its notification to the World Trade Organization (WTO) and exactly to the TBT Committee ( Technical Barriers to Trade). The TBT Committee will have 60 days’ time to send its comments to Brussels. The rule proposed by the Commission is very similar to the already existing one for honey, as Fischer Boel said during a press conference, expressing the hope that the new rules are approved “ before the end of the new year”. The case of the olive oil is not isolated. In the EU shops the origin of food must be précised (bovine meat, fish, fruit and vegetable, honey) but not for chicken, for example.
On the indication of origin on poultry a new struggle between Rome and Brussels has started.