Geographical indication (GI) is a designation that appears on goods that originate from a specific geographic region and have properties, reputation or characteristics primarily due to their place of origin.
Geographical indications have been protected for a long time in many countries of the world.
The right to a geographical indication allows its holders to prevent the use of a similar geographical indication by third parties whose products and goods do not meet applicable standards.
Geographical indication and appellation of origin (AO) are slightly similar to each other and are intended to indicate to the consumer about the origin of goods in a certain territory.
When state registration of an object of AO, they impose rather high requirements on the product itself and on the degree of its connection with the place of origin. A product protected by the AO is a unique product and cannot be created anywhere else.
For GIs, the requirements for the nature of the relationship between the place of origin and the properties of the goods have been reduced. That is, such a product can be produced in other regions, in which the properties of the product will also be determined by its place of origin to a large extent.
In addition, GIs are much less demanding on the characteristics of the product, which should be largely related to their place of origin. This is "a certain quality, reputation or other characteristics of the product." This definition assumes that a product may not possess any unique properties at all and may be similar to many others or even repeat them, but at the same time have a certain reputation and, on this basis, obtain legal protection.
