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Proposal to extend mandatory origin information for certain food products

In “A European Green Deal”

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Although origin labelling is already compulsory for certain food products (including fresh fruit and vegetables, unprocessed meat, fish, honey and olive oil), the Commission considers there is growing demand from consumers to know the origin of their food and to extend the mandatory origin indication to other categories. In the absence of EU rules, some Member States enacted provisionally national legislation requiring mandatory origin labelling for specific categories of food (such as milk and dairy products).

A proposal to revise EU rules on the information provided to consumers is part of the EU’s 2020 'farm to fork' strategy. As one of the actions under the strategy, the Commission considers proposing the extension of mandatory origin indication to certain other food products, such as milk and milk used as an ingredient, meat used as an ingredient, rice, durum wheat, potatoes and tomato used in certain tomato products.

A public consultation was open from 13 December 2021 to 7 March 2022. The vast majority (93%) of respondents believe consumers want to know the origin of food because they wish to support producers or the Economy of a region (87%), to be able to make an informed choice (86%) and because they consider it is an indicator for the environmental impact of a food product (80%). When presented with the choice of the following groups of products - milk, milk in dairy products, meat as the primary ingredient of processed foods, rabbit and game meat, rice, durum wheat used in pasta, potatoes, and tomato in tomato products - a majority (between 73% and 88%) of respondents across all product groups viewed the provision of mandatory origin indications as ‘very important’ or ‘important’.

Concerning the geographic level at which information on origin should be provided, for nearly all product groups 'country level' was the preferred option, with only milk having 'regional' level as the most selected response. Respondents were divided on the specification of the production process for which origin information should be provided. For rice, durum wheat, tomatoes and potatoes the predominant response was 'place of harvest', for milk and milk in dairy the most selected option was 'place of milking', while for meat and rabbit/game meat the preferred option was 'place of rearing/hunting/slaughtering'.

The Commission was expected to publish its proposal in 2023. However, it is mentioned neither in the Commission work programme for 2024 nor in the tentative agenda for forthcoming Commission meetings. It remains uncertain when this proposal will be tabled.

In parallel, in April 2024, the European Parliament and Council adopted a proposal revising the EU marketing standards  for certain 'breakfast directives'. Concerning honey labelling, the proposal makes it compulsory to clearly indicate, close to the product name, the countries of origin of the honey, 'in descending order of their share in weight, together with the percentage that each one represents'. However, EU countries would have the flexibility to enforce this obligation for the four largest shares only when they account for more than 50 % of the blend. Should this not be the case, the percentages would have to be indicated for all the countries of origin. To ensure flexibility, for packages of less than 30 g, the names of the countries of origin could be replaced by two-letter ISO codes. 

In contrast, MEPs did not manage to convince the Council to accept origin labelling for products other than honey – that is the fruit in juice, jams and marmalades, as well as the sugar in jams and marmalades. EU countries were concerned about the potential administrative burden this could place on food companies and the extra costs it could bring for consumers. Instead, the Commission will prepare within 36 months of the entry into force of the Directive – that is around spring 2027 – a report assessing the possibility of making labelling of the country of origin of the fruit used compulsory, accompanied, if appropriate, by a legislative proposal.

For a more detailed analysis, see fiche on 'Revision of EU marketing standards  for certain 'breakfast directives'.

More recently, EU farm ministers proved divided over the need for mandatory origin labelling to be rolled out to more foods. In a discussion at the 27 May Agriculture and Fisheries Council, Austria and Germany presented a note on "Country of origin labelling for foodstuffs", also signed by the Estonian, Finnish, French and Portuguese delegations. The paper calls on the incoming European Commission to "present a legislative proposal for an expansion of mandatory EU-wide country of origin labelling for foodstuffs" since, the text reads, it "is of great importance to consumers and farmers". EU Commissioner for financial services Mairead McGuinness, who replaced her colleague Janusz Wojciechowski for the origin labelling debate, clarified that "it is the next Commission – the incoming Commission – who would decide on whether there should be a proposal."

In July 2024, the European Commission formally registered a European Citizens Initiative – a Europe-wide petition – aimed at extending country of origin labelling to all foods and imposing the same environmental, health and labour standards on producers outside the EU as those within. The initiative 'Stop Fake Food: Origin on Label', has already gathered over a million signatures from more than seven EU countries, thus fulfilling the two formal conditions for the initiative to be considered by the Commission for further action.

In November 2024, replying to additional written questions in the follow-up to his confirmation hearing, Commissioner-Designate for Health and Animal welfare, Olivér Várhelyi, stated that he would prioritise addressing existing consumer demands for extended country of origin labelling, while ensuring the smooth functioning of the internal market, without committing to a new Commission proposal.

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Author: Ivana Katsarova, Members' Research Service, legislative-train@europarl.europa.eu

As of 20/11/2024.