Wine Law

11 4. Sanctions due to the Infringement of Designations of Origin and Geographical Indications The effectiveness of the protection of designations of origin and geographical indications largely depends on the sanctions provided for by the legal system and on the concrete application of the relevant rules by the Judges. In this respect, it is worth mentioning that, in recent years, the Parliament and the Government have been trying to strengthen the rules against infringement and the Judges, at the same time, have been issuing remarkable decisions. This trend is also due to the fact that the growing importance of designations of origin and geographical indications has brought infringers to intensify their unlawful behaviours, in order to profit from the qualitative characteristics of the original DOs and GIs and to gain important market shares. Coming now to the sanctions, it has to be recalled that there are two different kinds of rules against infringement: criminal sanctions and civil sanctions . The main difference is that criminal rules are aimed, most of all, at protecting a strong public interest, which, in the case of sanctions against infringement is constituted by the public faith and by the public economy. As a matter of fact, all sanctions against infringement are included in the section of the Italian Criminal Code dedicated to the crimes against public faith and public economy. However, the structure of rules against infringement of designations of origin and geographical indications partially differs from those against the infringement of trademarks and other distinctive signs. Indeed, in the case of DOs and GIs, the relevant provisions take also into account the interest of the original producers to be the unique users of the signs, in consideration of the strict geographical, qualitative and productive requirements included in the government of use. Similarly, civil sanctions are aimed at protecting, not only the public interest of consumers against any risk of deception and confusion, but also the prominent interest of the owners of the infringed designations of origin and geographical indications. The combined application of the different rules allows an effective protection of DOs and GIs, in favour of consumers and entrepreneurs. Starting from criminal sanctions, the main provision, which deserves to be analysed, is Article 517- quater of Italian Criminal Code, introduced in 2009. This rule sanctions the infringement, or alteration of geographical indications and designations of origin, as well