NOTE FOR THE FULL PROTECTION OF THE GREEK PDO FETA CHEESE IN CETA, EU-SADC ANDIN ALL BILATERAL TRADE AGREEMENTS BETWEEN THE EU AND ITS MAIN TRADE PARTNERS TO FOLLOW.

According to data from ELSTAT / Eurostat, IRI and the Journal of“Food and Beverage” of 2014, the Feta cheese industry in our country employs 100,000 shepherds, who are grazing 12 million sheep and goats in the Greek countryside and an estimated 400,000 people employed in the dairy / cheese industries and their related services. In total, more that 120,000 tonnes of feta cheese are produced per year in 500 cheese producing facilities. Greece’s annual exports of feta cheese, which are growing steadily, amount to 45,000 tonnes, sold in 56 countries and five continents, grossing a turnover of 260 million € per year. However, Greece produces and distributes only 28% of the cheese marketed as Feta in the world. This means that 72% of the global distribution of cheeses named Feta is covered by mass produced imitation Feta cheese products, which in the majority of cases are totally different than the authentic Greek Feta, as they are produced mainly from assembly line barn raised cows in the USA, Canada, S. Africa, Australia N.Z. etc.. Furthermore, they are fed with inferior quality commercial feeds and are injected with dangerous hormones and antibiotics.

It is this excess global demand of about 400,000 tonnes of imitation Feta, grossing more than a billion Euros a year, which causes so much conflict in the world markets between the authentic Greek Feta cheese Product Designation of Origin (PDO)producers and their numerous usurpers, who are marketing gross imitations of our authentic Greek PDO by exploiting its most valuable Intellectual Property Rights (IPRs) and its corresponding commendable market value.

The effort for the protection of Feta cheese in the EU went through several stages but finally in 2002 it was successfully registered by the European Commission (EC) as an EU PDO (regulation 1829/2002).

The EC has been granted the authority to negotiate bilateral free trade agreements, between the EU and its main trade partners, on behalf of the Council of EU Ministers, as envisaged in the 2009 Lisbon Treaty. After the collapse of the multilateral negotiations of the Doha Round in 2008, within the WTOframework, the EU opted to start negotiating bilateral trade agreements with its main partners, as Korea, 6 countries of Central America, Peru – Colombia & Ecuador, Canada, Singapore, Ukraine, Moldova, Georgia, Japan, USA,15 countries of the S. African Development Community (SADC),6 Latin American countries (MERCOSUR), Vietnam, Mexico,Australia,N. Zealand, Thailand, the Philippines, Indonesia and Turkey,

As far as Feta cheese in concerned, the illicit trade of “counterfeit” white cheese products made from cow's milk, produced fromlow-cost and low quality commercial feeds, is dominant in all of the above EU trade partner countries. For example in Canada,90% of the 3.500 tons of Feta labelled cheeses consumed yearly are gross imitations of Feta, competing side by side with the authentic Greek PDO, which is imported from Greece.

The EU-Canada CETA Agreement grants full protection to 145 EU PDOs in Canada, including to the two famous EU cheeses Parmegiano Reggiano and Roquefort, prohibiting, therefore, any distributers, big or small, from marketing any homonymous imitation cheeses in this market. Unfortunately, on the contrary, our flagship PDO Feta cheese, 5th in economic importance amongst 3000 EU PDOs, not only was not granted any worthwhile protection but for the first time in the history of EU bilateral trade Agreements, a most preferred Trade Partner, Canada, demanded from the most vulnerable EU m-s, Greece, to accept unfair competition against its most valuable PDO “Feta cheese” in its market, with the tolerance of our authorised negotiators, the EC. In short, all pre-existing homonymous to Feta imitation cheese products in the Canadian market, will continue to be sold side by side with our renowned PDO, in eternity. We are wondering, why Greece received such discriminatory treatment from Canada and why the EC did not protest regarding such bold and unethical request from such preferred trade partner of the EU? The multilateral rule of “fair competition” amongst trade partners is probably the most highly respected market economy rule in the world. Due to such unfair and discriminatory treatment against Greece in this Agreement, we are wondering about our legal rights, both in bilateral (Greece – EU / Greece – Canada) and multilateral context.

As if the catastrophic results of the CETA negotiations were not enough for our flagship PDO, the EC proceeded to secure us the same discriminatory results in the EU-SADC EPA Agreement, despite our timely protracted complaints. This time the results were even more discriminatory against us, as Feta cheese was singled out as the only EU PDO amongst 251, which did not receive any protection in the EU-SADC Agreement. Again, we are wondering why Greece, the most vulnerable link in the EU family of m-s, deserves such an unfair and discriminatory treatment regarding its most valuable PDO ‘Feta” in this Agreement? It is obvious that the unprecedented negotiation results of CETA have become a bad precedent to be repeated in the results of most of future EU bilateral trade Agreements. So, why has the EC treated us so unfairly and unequally compared to the rest of the EU m-s? With such long history of production, why should we accept such unfair and unethical demands from those who claim that they wish to be the EU’s most preferred trade partners?.

The Commission presented us with two conciliatory Declarations, supposedly acknowledging that the results of the negotiations in the above two Agreements were not the most ambitious regarding the protection of our flagship PDO Feta cheese and due to that, they will try to improve such results in the future.

The EC’s declaration of the EU trade Commissioner that a renegotiation for the full protection of feta cheese will take place after five years is not a binding legal text and does not guarantee the future safeguarding of feta cheese.

Basically, these international trade agreements are legitimising –with the stamp and signature of the European Commission, the European Parliament, as well as the Greek Government (if CETA will be ratified by the Greek Parliament, as proposed)- the current unfair competition posed by white cheeses, produced by multinational companies, which will continue to speculate in the global market abusively exploiting the name and the quality of feta cheese.

If feta cheese was protected in the markets of the 46 countrieswith which the EU is currently negotiating trade Agreements, all the counterfeit Feta imitation products would have been forced to change denominations, setting the stage for Feta cheese to reach the market value that it deserves, which should be more than double of today’s export prices. Such development would trigger an increase in demand and therefore of Feta production, along with a resulting rise in employment and related economic activities. Furthermore, if such prospects are combined with the promotion of the rest of 21 PDO Greek cheeses, there would be substantial growth in the sector in general, which in turn could jump start the ailing Greek economy as a whole..

Therefore, it is important to link this effort with the formation of a feta cheese consortium, which along withthe help of European agri-food aid programmes and the timely engagement of agri-friendly consumer movements, could revive and save the sector.

At a time when our country, after seven years of crisis and numerous austerity programs, is struggling to recover and to return to apath of sustainable development,it is suicidal to accept such discriminatory treatment against our emblematic PDO feta cheese, our principal strategic agri export product, associated with the traditional and cultural identity of our country.

The acceptance of the proposed results of the negotiations of the CETA and EU-SADC Agreements, which equate our authentic Greek PDO with all kinds of counterfeit low quality white cheeses, would be catastrophic for our renowned the word over genuine product and will cause disastrous consequences for the livestock and cheese industry in our country.

EU PDO products distributed in the markets of our most favoured EU trade partners are not simple products offered for speculation; they are sensitive public goods, because they embody the traditional mode of production, the biodiversity and the culture of the local communities where they are produced.

We defend the EU acquis, which registered feta cheese as a PDO product and in parity with equally important EU cheese PDOs, the EU’s principles for fair trade and fair competition, along with those ofthe right to preference and the right of the consumers to be well informed so they could make the right choices.

We call on the members of the Greek National Parliament, to reject the EU-SADC and CETA discriminatory Agreements, as such, when they come to our Parliament for adaption, until these two EU supposedly most preferred trade partners after a prompt renegotiation of European Commission, grant us equal and similar protection for our PDO Feta cheese, as they have granted to all other EU m-s. Additionally, our Parliament’s veto of these two catastrophic for us Agreements, would teach the EC a lesson, so that in the future it would treat all m-s equally and fairly and would make sure to achieve the protection of our flagship PDO, feta cheese, in all international trade agreements between the EU and its trade partners, enforcing, therefore, the productive, environmental and social quality standards in Europe, according to the EU acquis.

Consequently, if such unprecedented and unfair negotiation results for our flagship PDO, by the EC, in the above mentioned agreements are not challenged by the Greek people’s representatives in the National Parliament, they will prove catastrophic for our flagship PDO and our overall endangered agrifood sector.

We co-sign the Proposal to the Parliament and to the European Commission,

4/2017

1)Region of Thessaly

2) Region of W. Macedonia

3) Federation of shepherd Farmers of Thessaly

4) Association of Cheese Producers Larissa

5) Pan-Hellenic Association of Breeders

6) SEVGAP

7) Network Stop ttip, ceta, tisa

8) Greek Friends of Nature

9) Agricultural Association of Cereals & Livestock Products Kastorias

10) Organic Management of Products, By-products & Outputs Feta PDO

11) Agricultural Dairy Cooperative of Kalavrita

12) Municipality of Larissa

13) Municipality of Tirnavos

14) Financial Chamber of Larissa

15) NGO Volunteer NGO Network of Thessaly

16) Thessalian Citizens of the World for Sustainable Development

17) Ecological Thessaly

18) Association of Young Farmers of Larissa

19) Terpsithea Local Council

20) Almyros Environmental Initiative 'In Action'

21) Elassona's Perevia Network

22) Friends of the Institute of N. Poulantzas

23) Active Citizens of Larissa

24) Union of Writers of Larissa

25) Association of Organic Farmers of Thessaly

26) Aegilopas, Magnesia Biodiversity Network

27) Vineyard Professionals Association

28) Common ngo Trikala

29) Oikosfera ngo

30) Traversing Streets of Thessaly

31) Friends of Earth-Trikala

32) Panhellenic Association of Young Farmers - Thessaly

33) Ecological management of Feta products

34) GEOTECHNICAL CHAMBER OF GREECE / GEOTEE

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