Fighting to let Australian winemakers continue using the name Prosecco,
the federal government has recently given a $100k grant to researchers at
Monash University for exploring the legal basis to protect wines with Geographical Indications (GIs) in trade
agreements.
Dan Tehan, the federal education minister, announced that with the grant
for the Australian Research Council’s Linkage Projects, they want the
university to provide recommendations on GI claims to the Australian government
and industry bodies.
According to researchers at Monash University, Australia’s Prosecco exports,
which worth $60 million annually, are prophesied to rise to around $500 million
over the next decade. The research team includes Professor Moira Paterson,
Professor Mark Davison, Dr. Caroline Henckels, and Dr. Lisa Spagnolo, from
Monash University’s Faculty of Law.
A specialist in Intellectual Property Law (IP Law), Dr. Enrico
Bonadio from the City University of London, has also participated as a member
of the team. The legal specialists investigated the criteria, evidence, and
procedure required to establish a GI of wine, as utilized in trade agreements
and legal disputes.
However, the EU (European Union) wants wine producers to prohibit
marketing wine labeled as Prosecco. It claimed that the term Prosecco is a GI
for a sort of wine being locally made in northern Italy and isn’t considered as
a grape variety.
Professor Davison said that if Prosecco is the name of a grape variety
and isn’t a GI, the prohibition of its use in trademarks on Australian Prosecco
would possibly contravene Article 2.1 of the Technical Barriers to Trade
Agreement and Article 20 of the TRIPS Agreement. He added that they’re grateful
to the Federal Government for the financial support to develop a legal
framework and associated guidelines to defend GIs for wines, and to aid the
Australian wine manufacturing industry in dealing with Geographical Indication Infringement claims and Geographical Indication Registration issues.
Since the early 2000s, Prosecco has been produced in Australia and used
worldwide as a grape variety until 2009. But then in the same year, it was
recognized as a GI under Italian Geographical Indication Law through the creation
of a Denominazione di Origine Controllata across the Veneto and Friuli regions.
Later in the year 2013, the European Commission attempted to register
Prosecco as a Geographical Indication in Australia but failed after the
Winemakers’ Federation of Australia successfully argued that it was the name of
a grape variety. For more visit: https://www.trademarkmaldives.com
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