GIFT

What we do

This preparatory project contributes to the competitiveness and visibility of local food, handicraft and tourism SMEs in NPA area by creating a main project application, which aims to promote SMEs co-operation as well as contribute to wider visibility and recognition of the whole NPA geographical area by enhancing the use of EUs geographical indications (GI) system and tools associated to it.

What is EUs GI system and why we should enhance it’s use in the NPA region?

The EU GI system protects the names of products (food and non-food) that originate from specific regions and have specific qualities or enjoy a reputation linked to the production territory.

Via the GI system the uniqueness of food products and handicraft can be promoted, it enables a better price and links the products to their geographical origin, thus safeguarding the local production. Furthermore, local tourism SMEs can highlight better their local or regional specificity. However, so far, there are quite few products in this system in NPA area. We recognized that one of the main reasons is lack of information of the system and lack of know-how to support applications, even though potential products as well as interested applicant groups exist in also in NPA area.

The potential of EUs GI system in the NPA area

The partners of GIFT preparatory project conducted an inventory report of the potential GI products in the NPA area. The inventory made it clear that there are many products in several countries that could be applied to this system and thus, enjoy the benefits and marketing resources of it. The novel approach is to create a cross-border co-operation to support multi-country applications. The potential of the label has been also recognized in tourism to support authenticity and in competitive industries to gain more prestigious status.