Regulation (EC) No 110/2008 of the European Parliament and the Council on the definition, description, presentation, labelling and the protection of geographical indications for spirit drinks included Irish Poteen/Irish Poitín for the first time in the list of geographical indications of spirit drinks “originating in the territory of a country or region where a given quality, reputation or other characteristic of the spirit drink is essentially attributed to its geographical origin”. As with all the established spirit drinks geographical indications for Member States listed in Regulation (EC) No 110/2008, a technical file for Irish poitín/Irish poteen has to be submitted to the European Commission by 20 February 2015 to retain geographical indication status. My Department is working closely with the trade to finalise the technical file.
Registration of the name without the word Irish would go beyond the established geographical indication and would require a Commission proposal and agreement by the European Parliament and the Council on amending the list of geographical indications in Annex III to Regulation (EC) No 110/2008. That could not be achieved by 20 February but the prospects of obtaining sufficient support for such an amendment could be considered at a later stage. Any other Member State or third country wishing to register poteen or poitín together with the name of their Member State or of a geographical area within the Member State would have to submit an application for a new geographical indication and demonstrate in that application the link with that geographical area and the specific character of the drink attributable to the geographical area.
