The Deputy Minister of Trade and Industry, Faton Thaçi, at the round table on “Geographic Indicators – Sharri Cheese” said that we as a government in this mandate have gave the priority to develop economic by growing production and local products, including the production of products coming from regions or specific parts of Kosovo, which compositions contain geographical indications or designations of origin such as Sharr’s cheese.
Mr. Thaci further added that protection of products through designations of origin and geographical indications is a well-known practice in the European Union and beyond, and has proven to help economic development and the preservation of the traditions on production of special products.
Deputy Minister Thaçi repeated that Kosovo thanks to the cooperation and contribution of the French Embassy in Kosovo, the French Ministry of Agriculture and its experts, possesses a sound legal and technology infrastructure and protection mechanisms for the Geographic Indicators, so from this meeting I call for a positive approach and to come up with a concrete Operation Plan and working groups to finalize the great launch project such as:
- GI project on “Sharri’s cheese”, and
- To initiate actions between the working group and parties of interests – with producers of Kosovo’s wine, and
- Identification of other geographic indicators, with what Kosovo as a country is reach with products of its origin.
Mr. Joseph Giustiniani, attaché for cooperation at the French embassy in Kosovo, thanked Deputy Minister Thaçi for the organization of this roundtable, expressing the willingness to support local producers, with particular emphasis on geographical indications such as Sharr's cheese. He said that we have identified ways to support producer associations such as defining products on how to produce cheese and the definition of a product threshold and what kind of cheese should be protected.
At the end of this meeting was established a working group headed by MTI, namely by the Industrial Property Agency and members of relevant ministries, also members from Sharr's cheese producers associations. As target for the working group remained that until the April to finalize technical-operational issues for application of geographic indications.