Efforts on in EU to render basmati rice as a generic variety, denying protected geographical indication

Efforts are underway in the European Union (EU) to try to deny protected geographical indication (PGI) status for basmati rice from India and render it as a generic variety of the cereal.

Some experts in Europe are claiming that the sales of rice labelled as fragrant rice are ten times the output in the origin areas. The experts, however, have no proof or laboratory findings to prove that 90 per cent of rice sold as basmati is non-basmati, said trade sources.

Giving PGI status provides a country with the right to market a product exclusively, stating that it has unique properties and is specially grown in a particular region within its borders. It also gets a premium.

In a video on the German media outlet DW, Delphine Marie‑Vivien of CIRAD, a French public agricultural research institution, said the area under cultivation in the basmati origin areas did not match the production.

In 2024, she warned that a delay in granting PGI for basmati could make it a generic rice variety. In the same report, an unnamed European Commission (EC) source talked of a “balanced outcome” in the battle for PGI in the Union.

The source spoke of separate protection for Indian and Pakistani basmati, while favouring a joint solution to the issue. The EU has been urging India and Pakistan to submit a joint application for a GI.

However, experts say that such a move will compromise India’s sovereign rights, as Pakistan has given parts of India as regions where the long-grained rice is grown.

India applied for PGI in July 2018, and the EU has been dragging its feet on the application. During this period, Pakistan applied for PGI in April 2024. There are three issues with the Pakistan application. One, it claims India’s basmati areas as its. Two, it says basmati is a shared product with India. Three, it got domestic PGI registration for its basmati only in 2021.

This means the EU did not act on India’s application despite Pakistan not having a valid domestic GI registration and seems to have waited for Islamabad to complete the required formalities, trade sources said.

Marie‑Vivien worked on basmati rice earlier under the EU-funded SINER-GI research project. It was intended to provide inputs for the EU’s GI policy. However, the project report disclaimed it represented the European Commission’s official position.

Though the EU-India free trade agreement (FTA) was concluded in January this year, a separate agreement for GI products is under negotiation. EC records show GI negotiations only till March 2024, even though other negotiations with India have continued.

Sources said this is proof that the EC did not want the basmati PGI issue to derail a wider trade agreement. However, it did not resolve the basmati issue either.