Euromontana's answers on the public consultation on agricultural product quality policy

For several years, Euromontana has been working on mountain quality food products.  Euromontana strongly believes that although mountain areas suffer from some handicaps such as remoteness, climate, low population density, they have on the other hand a comparative advantage on quality. This is why the association initiated in 2002 a two year research project on the specificities (regarding the product itself but also its condition of production) of mountain quality food products. The results of that programme showed that:

• there is a strong link between the mountain origin and the products attributes;
• the mountain argument is seldom used as a selling argument as such, although pictures of mountains are frequently displayed on the products packages;
• but the term “mountain” is also seldom and unevenly protected throughout Europe.

For Euromontana, the comparative advantage of mountain in quality must be exploited through different strategies: the existing quality schemes (especially PDO and PGI) are part of the possible strategies, as well as the organic label, but they should be improved and complemented by other specific to mountains, in order to protect the use of the mountain image.