Argentina Wins Labeling Dispute Against Spain

The EU has long had a virtual monopoly over a realm of trade dispute known as “labeling,” using a name on a product label that invokes a specific region, concentration of ingredients, or production process. Time-crafted traditions that, after generations, yield global renown should be protected from any Johnny-come-lately ripping off the name. That’s the logic.

And so it is that over the past several decades Italy has staked its claim to pasta, Germany to beer, France to Champagne and Roquefort, England to Sherry and on and on. Such claims were taken as a matter of national pride, a way of preserving pockets of uniqueness in artisanal lands being cast under the homogenizing tide of European integration.

To outsiders, the squabbles have been largely seen as quaint a way for “old Europe” to protect domestic industries that are no longer competitive in a price conscious, globalized market. Moreover, the labeling system hashed out in the EU has found mixed support abroad. American brewers won a case against Czech beer makers, leaving “Budvar” to be sold in Europe and the same beer being sold under the “Czechvar” label in the US and Canada. As a snipe to producers in California French vintners have taken out ads in prominent US magazines: “Unmask the truth: Champagne only comes from Champagne, France.”

Two days ago, Argentina won a 12-year long suit against Spain over the right to label a certain type of red wine ‘La Rioja.’ At more than 35,000 square miles, the wine producing province of La Rioja, Argentina, dwarfs the size of its Spanish namesake, and its population is slightly smaller. Naturally, Spain appealed to tradition. La Rioja’s wines were first recognized by the King of Navarre and Aragon in 1102 (390 years before the consolidation of Spain), and documents specifically safeguarding the quality of the region’s wine date to 1650.

While there aren’t any signs of a political fallout between the two countries, Argentina’s victory in the La Rioja case might curb the enthusiasm of European countries to press labeling claims, because under the surface of one European tradition there sometimes lays another, colonialism.