European Union geographical indications for craft and industrial products: Unlocking protection for regional identity and local know-how
Author: Florina Firaru
From December 1, 2025, craft and industrial (“CI”) products will fully benefit from EU-wide geographical indications (“GI”/“GIs”) protection under Regulation (EU) 2023/2411[1] (the “Regulation”).
GI and the protection extended to CI products
GIs confer intellectual property rights on product names whose unique qualities are intrinsically linked to their place of production.
While GIs are better known in the agricultural, wine, spirits and food sectors (for example, “Champagne”, “Roquefort”, “Telemea de Sibiu[2]” or “Irish Whiskey”), the EU has extended this protection to provide official recognition of origin for CI products, such as woodwork, textiles, lace, cutlery, glass, porcelain etc.
According to the Regulation (Articles 4 and 6) CI refers to products:
- made either entirely by hand or with the aid of manual or digital tools, or by mechanical means, whenever the manual contribution is an important component of the finished product; or
- made in a standardised way, including serial production and by using machines.
For the name of a CI product to qualify for GI protection, the product must comply with the following requirements:
- the product must originate in a specific place, region or country;
- the product has a quality, reputation or other characteristic that is essentially attributable to its geographical origin; and
- at least one of the production steps (for example manufacturing, processing, obtaining, extracting, cutting or preparation) takes place in the defined geographical area.
The link between a product and a place may derive from traditional know-how, specific production techniques, locally sourced raw materials, or historical reputation associated with the place/region/country.
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[1] Regulation (EU) 2023/2411 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 18 October 2023 on the protection of geographical indications for craft and industrial products and amending Regulations (EU) 2017/1001 and (EU) 2019/1753.
[2] Telemea de Sibiu PGI is a semi-hard cheese made from sheep’s milk, produced in the rustic wilderness of Transylvania, Romania.
