Pity the poor folk who are no longer the big cheeses

PITY the people of Cheddar, Brie, and Gouda. Success has robbed them of their great culinary inheritance, now to become the property of all Europe.

The European Commission has proposed that the designations of these great cheeses, along with Camembert, Emmental and Edam, should no longer be regarded as geographical but generic. Any cheese which meets their general descriptions may be so described, thus getting a slice of the action.

Crackers, you may say. But the Commission has also stepped in to protect the names and reputations of 318 local products, from cheeses to fruits, fresh meats and olive oils - this is merely an initial list to be supplemented - whose imitators must now confess they are not the genuine article.

They will still be able to sell their products in the EU but will have to find a name that is not imitative or cannibalised from the noble original "gorgonzola-like" will not do.

So in Stilton, Gloucester, Pont l'Eveque, and Roquefort, to mention but some, they were probably last night raising a glass of Rutland bitter or Hereford cider to the Commission.

They were not doing so anywhere in Ireland, however, because among the 1,400 local products whose protection is being sought, there is not one Irish product. No list was submitted, but An Bord Bia is now consulting the Department of Agriculture to remedy this.

Nor were they drinking the Commission's health in Denmark which has finally lost its battle to save Danish "feta", one of the country's great exports. Feta, after the five year transition period, will be solely the name for Greek cheese, although in a compromise aimed at buttering up the Danes, they will not lose their right to export their product from the EU as feta or to export refunds.

Asked by an Italian journalist to acknowledge that "feta" was originally an Italian word meaning "slice", and that it should, therefore, be confined to Italian food, the Agriculture Commissioner, Mr Franz Fischler, said he thought "linguistic derivation is not a way to determine policy in this area".

However, Mr Fischler did acknowledge that Parma ham was not to be described as Parma ham unless sliced either in Parma or in the presence of its final purchaser.

Mr Fischler explained that the Commission was merely transposing national regulations which prevent intermediaries from debasing the coinage by dilution with lesser products.