Suiza reconoció la Denominación de Origen del Café de Huila de Colombia

Suiza reconoció la denominación de origen del Café de Huila, protegiendo los granos producidos en el departamento colombiano localizado al suroccidente del país entre el nacimiento del Río Riachón, municipio de Colombia y el pico de la Fragua, municipio de Acevedo, y entre el Alto de Las Oseras, municipio de Colombia y el páramo de Las Papas, municipio de San Agustín. 

Fernando Castro, miembro del Comité Nacional de Cafeteros, confirmó la noticia y destacó que el hecho blindará los intereses de los caficultores huilenses, pues tendrán la posibilidad de recibir mejores precios y garantizará que ningún café de otros orígenes sea comercializado bajo la denominación ‘Café del Huila’.

Según informó “[l]a noticia es que las denominaciones de orígenes hasta ahora son reconocidas por Colombia, sin embargo, la denominación de origen del café de Colombia y la de Huila fueron reconocidas por el Gobierno suizo y es la primera vez que Suiza da un reconocimiento a un país o territorio fuera del de ellos”.

Además en directivo colombiano sostuvo que el reconocimiento dado por Suiza beneficiará a los granos de Huila en los países que conforman la Unión Europea, y le permitirá posicionarse ese mercado junto con "ayudar a que el sobreprecio de estos cafés, independientemente si se negocian por intermedio de la Federación o no, lleguen directamente a los caficultores". Agregó que "hay que recordar que recientemente la Federación Nacional de Cafeteros hizo una batalla jurídica para que el Gobierno español le quitara la patente a un comerciante que tenía la marca café del Huila registrada a su nombre, perjudicando a nuestros productores. Esto garantiza que no vuelva a ocurrir nunca más en la Unión Europea”.

Este reconocimiento es el resultado de años de trabajo de la Federación Nacional de Cafeteros, que por medio del análisis de más de 1.900 muestras de café recolectadas en la zona geográfica del Huila examinadas con la tecnología de espectro infrarrojo cercano, pudo obtener la huella del café del Huila, esencial para implementar el uso de su Denominación de Origen.

La cobertura de la declaratoria para el café del Huila sólo ampara a la especie Coffea Arabica, que se siembra en la región, y a las variedades que previo estudio son recomendadas por Cenicafé, dentro de las cuales se incluye la variedad Castillo.

 

Fuente: http://www.lanacion.com.co

Bacardi Rum Havana Club – clearly not made in the Havana, uh?

A federal judge dismissed a lawsuit by Pernod Ricard against Bacardi. Pernord Richard, the premium spirits and wine company in the U.S., requested for an injunction stopping Bacardi U.S.A. from using "Havana Club" as the name for a rum that is made in Puerto Rico, rather than in Havana, Cuba. The U.S. District Court in Delaware dismissed the lawsuit.

Who has the right to the Havana Club brand?
The Arrechabala family, a Cuban family, created the brand of rum in Cuba in 1935.
On one hand, Pernod argument was that by using the name Havana, which is a well-known city for rum, for non-Cuban rum would mislead consumers. On the contrary, Bacardi believes that they are entitled to the name because it uses the Arechabala formula to make its rum.

The judge ruled that Havana Club rum Barcadí has a "Cuban heritage,'' derived from the family recipe Arrechabala. The judge also ruled that, Bacardi labels indicate ''that the rum is distilled in Puerto Rico'' and so the company is not misleading consumers.

In a statement John Esposito, president of Bacardi USA based in Coral Gables, explains the importance of this decision. He said that it “protects our ability to properly introduce Cuban heritage and geographical origin of our rums”.

Some points
• Geographical Indication(GI): this is the thorny question. The reason being that I am trying to prepare a paper for the forthcoming seminar in Alicante and guess what? It is a mess. I did have a simple definition for it and I did understand quite well until...I start reading all the Latin America literature regarding this issue. It is so confusing how they (or us) interchange words and thus the result is, as my mother use to said, a ‘letter soup’. Or, is a GI the same as a Designation of Origin (DO), or a DO the same as an appellation of origin or GI the same as Appellation of Origin? and I also found geographical appellation! When I finished reading the material collected I could not remember what a GI was!

I then read the TRIPS where clearly states what is Geographical Indications – indications that identify a good as originating in a particular territory, region. This is indeed a very broad concept. For example the EU regulation in this matter identify between Designation of Origin, Geographical Indication and traditional speciality guaranteed. The first two are the most common. DO protects and cover products which are produced, processed and prepared in the said geographical area and GI which is the most common one, protects and cover products which at least one of the stages have taken place in the said geographical area.

Now, under which principal can Bacardi claim any right? There is the situation as in here where a group of manufacturers and associations can share the ‘goodwill’ of a product and thus are entitled to use the ‘mark’. But the question is, could a ‘recipe’ be the link claimed here?

There are many cases in the EU (Champagne, Sherry, Advoocaat, upon others) that said NO. There are also cases of parallel import where even same companies can stop the same product for entering the country (Colgate Palmolive- toothpaste case). The idea is that Geographical Indication indicates more than a simple link; it indicates quality that a particular area has.

• The United States generally opposes to the protection of Geographical Indications considering that they are commonly used as generic terms e.g. parmesan cheese, feta, camembert, champagne. Yet, it protects some of its own products, e.g. Florida orange juice, Idaho Potatoes, Vidalia onions.

I leave you then with some ideas, I am going to make a cake for my kids - I will follow my granny’s recipe and it will be the same!

Vale dos Sinos recognised as a protected geographical indication

It is estimated that Brazilian leather industry represents a US$ 2 billion business and currently employs approximately 65,000 persons. Today Brazil produces nearly 45 million processed leather goods annually. Vale dos Sinos, in the State of Rio Grande do Sul (southern Brazil), accounts for 40% of this production.

Last month, the Brazilian Patent and Trademark Office (BPTO) recognized Vale dos Sinos as a Protected Geographical Indication (PGI) for finished leather. This is the first PGI for non-agricultural products registered in Brazil.

The BPTO has already declared as local PGIs (i) Vale dos Vinhedos (in Rio Grande do Sul) for wines, (ii) Região do Cerrado Mineiro (in Minas Gerais) for coffee, (iii) Pampa Gaúcho da Campanha Meridional (in Rio Grande do Sul) for bovine meat and derivatives and (iv) Paraty (in Rio de Janeiro) for Aguardentes, tipo cachaça e aguardente composta azulada, a distilled beverage obtained from the sugar cane.

In the same track goes Vale do Submédio São Francisco, approved in the meantime by the BPTO as a PGI for grapes and mangos. At this moment, there are now seven Geographical Indications applications pending at the BPTO ranging from coffee, water to electronic equipments.

The use of Geographical Indications for designating local produces has caught the attention of the Brazilian people and it appears that the success of Vale dos Vinhedos for wines (this being the first national PGI, granted in 2002) and the economic benefits generated by the growth rate of tourists in the region between 2002 and 2007 (almost 170%) is one of the reasons for the steady increase of GIs in Brazil.

Posted by Jeremy on behalf of Jorge Miguel Arruda da Veiga, Di Blasi, Parente, Vaz e Dias & Associados