ORGANIZATIONS FOR CERTIFICATION OF DOP (PROTECTED ORIGIN DENOMINATION) AGRICULTURAL AND FOODSTUFFS PRODUCTS (Advisory opinion)
PRESS RELEASE
The Italian Competition Authority submitted to the Speakers of the Senate and Chamber of Deputies, the Prime Minister and the Minister of Agricultural Policy an advisory opinion concerning Section 54 of Parliamentary Bill no. 1780-C stating provisions in order to comply with the requirements on protection of DOP agricultural and foodstuffs products set forth in the so-called European Law 1995-1997.
Section 54 provides that any protected denomination or geographical indication shall be subject to control by a sole private organization or the territorially competent Authorities which are coordinated between themselves.
The Competition Authority deemed that this exclusivity principle would violate both the Community competition law and Law 287/90. Indeed, such a Section permits consortia to indicate the organizations for certification in such a way as to limit the freedom of choice of the members of the consortia.
According to the Parliamentary Bill, certification activity is to be conducted by public authorities, which do not need any specific authorization, or private organizations, which, by contrast, have to grant a Ministerial Authorization even in the case they are accredited at international level. The Authority found that such a criterion would discriminate against private organizations as well as to impede the entry into the market of certification activity of the European firms which are already accredited by their respective national certification authorities.