A technicality could throw away the 50 million labels already printed for Italian wines. The report of the sector associations is in this direction. It all revolves around a new European regulation that will come into force on December 8th, requiring producers to provide consumers with information about the calories and contents of wines and aromatized wine products.
This is a regulation adopted in 2021, so companies have two years to prepare for it. Additionally, under pressure from industry lobbies, the legislation allowed manufacturers to somehow get around the requirement to include calorie information and ingredients list information on the paper label (and therefore more visibly): a QR code on the label that links to a website where this information is available. That’s what wineries do. But in a way that the European Commission did not like.
In fact, to ensure that consumers understand what the QR code does, the majority of manufacturers have placed the ISO 2760 registered symbol, the black and white circular sign with the letter “i” inside it, which literally indicates “information”. “. Brussels claims that not only is it not enough to clarify the role of the QR code, but the symbol cannot be associated with the full contents of the new labeling, in particular the list of ingredients. That is why the Commission has recently published guidelines calling on companies to include the word “ingredients” in full on the paper label.
An invitation that raised the rebellion of Ceev, the European lobby of the industry, of which the Italian Wine Association Uiv is a part. Manufacturers are calling on the Commission to suspend the rules and allow the use of labels printed so far. For Italy alone, this number would be over 50 million, according to the UIV. Without exemptions, the labels risk going to waste, companies say.
Brussels disagrees: “Labels printed and already used on bottled wines and bottles placed on the market must not be destroyed, and bottled wines must not be relabeled, as all wines produced before 8 December are exempt from the new rules,” a Commission spokesperson told Eunews. Brussels reminds that companies have two years to prepare and that it is in the interest of manufacturers to adequately inform consumers.
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Source: Today IT
Karen Clayton is a seasoned journalist and author at The Nation Update, with a focus on world news and current events. She has a background in international relations, which gives her a deep understanding of the political, economic and social factors that shape the global landscape. She writes about a wide range of topics, including conflicts, political upheavals, and economic trends, as well as humanitarian crisis and human rights issues.
