Wine Law

14 Several issues were addressed by the Directive that up until then had been either almost or fully ignored by the European lawmakers. First of all, are worth mentioning rules for the so-called “ Varietal wines ”, i.e. the use of indicating on the label the wine grape varieties and the vintage year for wines without DO and GI. Given the differences between products covered by this Regulation and their markets, as well as the expectations of consumers, the rules had to be differentiated according to the products concerned, in particular as far as certain optional particulars used for wines without PDO and PGI, which, nevertheless, bear wine grapes varieties’ names and vintage years if they conform with a certification accreditation. Therefore, in order to distinguish, within the category of wines without PDO/PGI, those that fall under the subcategory “varietal wines” from those that do not benefit from this openness, specific rules on the use of optional particulars were established, on the one hand, for wines with PDO and PGI and, on the other, for wines without PGO and PGI, which could be, in a specific case, varietal wines. Varietal wines were introduced into the wine legislation by Regulation (EC) No 1234/2007 31 and Application Regulation No 607/2009 32 . We will see in greater detail the specific rules in Italy for varietal wines in point 4.4. of this article. The shape of the bottle may obviously also be registered as a trademark; even more so, the use of specific types of bottles for certain products is a long-lived practice in the Community and third countries since such bottles can evoke particular characteristics or a certain origin of products in the minds of consumers due to their long-established use and should therefore be reserved for the wines in question. Regulation (EC) No 479/2008 was setting out as well the rules for labelling third-country wine sector products circulating on the Community market, which were harmonised, as far as possible, with the approach laid down for Community wine sector products in order to avoid misleading consumers and unfair competition for producers. However, it took one year for the Commission to publish Regulation No 607/2009, which finally laid down 31 Council Regulation (EC) No 1234/2007 of 22 October 2007 establishing a common organisation of agricultural markets and on specific provisions for certain agricultural products (Single CMO Regulation). 32 Commission Regulation (EC) No 607/2009 of 14 July 2009 laying down certain detailed rules for the implementation of Council Regulation (EC) No 479/2008 as regards protected designations of origin and geographical indications, traditional terms, labelling and presentation of certain wine sector products.