Certification of cheeses and cheese products origin by EU countries
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to analyze the Protected Designation of Origin (PDO), Protected Geographical Indication (PGI) and Traditional Speciality Guaranteed (TSG) utilization on European Union (EU) cheese market.
Design/methodology/approach
Secondary data comes from the database of origin and registration. In total, 235 product names registered in the database for cheeses and cheese products were analyzed according to type of label and country of origin. To discover a dependences between the variables, χ2 test and contingency coefficients were calculated. Hierarchical clustering method enabled to identify the clusters of countries with similar distribution of products in the database.
Findings
More than 80 percent of cheeses and cheese products are certified with PDO. Leading countries in number of certified products are France and Italy. Taking into account all product classes in the database, only 6 percent of all PGIs, 33 percent of PDOs and 15 percent of TSGs were awarded for cheeses and cheese products. A middle weak correlation between the number of certified products and the country of origin was confirmed.
Research limitations/implications
The number of certified products is continuously increasing, their distribution between countries may change slightly over time. Only cluster analysis and two criteria of comparison were used.
Practical implications
To local food producers, the findings provide a more deep insight to the EU cheese market. It could stimulate their effort in products certification.
Originality/value
The paper brings findings about PDO/PGI/TSG utilization for cheese products in EU countries. There is not research study carried out from the same perspective.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The research was supported by the European Social Fund within the project CZ.1.07/2.3.00/20.0296 and project IGA “Analysis of quality labels utilizations on the Czech foodstuff market and efficiency of campaigns for their support”, Nr. F2/94/2015.
Citation
Velčovská, Š. and Sadílek, T. (2015), "Certification of cheeses and cheese products origin by EU countries", British Food Journal, Vol. 117 No. 7, pp. 1843-1858. https://doi.org/10.1108/BFJ-10-2014-0350
Publisher
:Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2015, Emerald Group Publishing Limited