Colours by Europe | EU Quality & Organic labels

EU quality schemes are the mark of European excellence, while the EU organic logo certifies the production of high-quality products with low environmental impact.

EU organic label

Organic labelling certifies that specific EU agricultural food products conform to strict production, processing, transportation and storage conditions, minimising the impact on the environment. The EU organic logo appears on all pre-packaged EU food products produced and sold as ‘organic’ in accordance with legislation; stated simply, at least 95% of the ingredients were organically farmed.

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Protected designation of origin (PDO)

PDO covers EU agricultural food products that are produced, processed and prepared in a given geographical area using recognised local know-how. This means that all aspects of production, preparation and processing must take place in the specific region of origin.

Côtes du Rhône PDO

Côtes du Rhône are the 21 basic varieties of red, white, and rosé wines from the wine-growing Rhône region in France. The red blends are most well-known, and made from Grenache, Mourvèdre, or Syrah grapes planted on a variety of different soils which contribute to their unique character.

Ouzo / Oύζο PDO

This clear alcoholic beverage from Cyprus and Greece is similar in taste to other anise liqueurs like pastis, sambuca, and raki.

Feta / Φέτα PDO

Feta – meaning slice - is a distinctive Greek cheese. It is white with a very intense salty and tangy flavour and comes in blocks submerged in brine. It is quite compact to touch, with small irregular holes but no rind. Only cheese made in the traditional way from certain parts of Greece can be labelled as Feta PDO.

Kalamata / Καλαμάτα PDO

Kalamata Extra Virgin Olive Oil PDO is made from cold pressed Koroneiki olives in the Messinia region of Greece. Its colour ranges from an intense to a golden green. Flavour-wise it has medium fruitiness, with an aroma of green fruit, light bitterness and light to medium pungency.

Tokaj / Tokaji PDO

Tokaj PDO is a sweet white, golden wine made from aszú grapes in the Tokaj region of Hungary or the adjoining Tokaj wine region in Slovakia. Named by King Louis XIV of France ‘the wine of kings, the king of wines’ and mentioned in the official anthem of Hungary, the wine from this region has an even older tradition than champagne.

Prosecco PDO

Prosecco PDO is an Italian white wine named after the village of Prosecco in the province of Trieste. It is predominantly made from the Prosecco grape (renamed Glera in 2009 within the European Union) and is almost always made in sparkling (spumante) or semi-sparkling (frizzante) style. A still wine version (tranquillo) also exists.

Szegedi szalámi / Szegedi téliszalámi PDO

Szegedi szalámi PDO, or winter salami, is a type of Hungarian salami made from pork and spices. A simple yet flavourful cured meat, it has a delicate peppery and savoury taste.

Porto PDO

Vinho do Porto (Port) PDO is a fortified wine that comes from the Douro Valley in Portugal. It was named after the seaport city of Porto where much of the product was brought to market for export to other countries in Europe. There are a number of red Port varieties (including ruby and tawny) as well as white and rose.

Telemea de Ibăneşti PDO

Telemea de Ibăneşti PDO is a traditional cheese from Romania made from sheep and cow’s milk. It is soft white with a creamy texture and a salty, tangy aftertaste. It is permeated with little holes or ‘eyes’ throughout.

Upplandskubb PDO

Upplandskubb PDO is a traditionally produced rustic bread from Uppland, Sweden. It is made from local rye and wheat flour, and is boiled in a water bath rather than baked which means that the bread has no crust. Its texture is fine and compact and somewhat sticky on the inside, with small cavities. The bread is produced in a cylindrical shape with a diameter of 16-23 cm. This means that a slice is a segment of a circle.

Latvijas Lielie Pelēkie Zirņi PDO

Latvijas lielie pelēkie zirņi PDO are dried Latvian grey peas of the ‘Retrija’ variety. These peas have an especially large, coarse seed with a marbled pattern that give them a greyish tinge. When boiled they have a soft, floury consistency and a mild yet distinct flavour, which comes from the skin.

Azeite de Moura PDO

Azeite de Moura PDO is Portuguese extra virgin olive oil. It is characterized by a goldish and green colour tone. Due to the absence of refinement methods, it has more concentration of vitamins and minerals such as vitamin E, Omega 3, and fatty acids.

Fromage de Herve PDO

Fromage de Herve PDO is a soft cheese made from cow’s milk and shaped into a small cube, with a beige body and a washed brick-coloured rind. It has a firm, elastic, and smooth texture, with a rich flavour.

Kolokasi Sotiras /Κολοκάσι Σωτήρας PDO

Kolokasi Sotiras PDO, known as Cyprus taro, is a root vegetable grown in Cyprus. Shaped like a spinning top and similar in size to a potato, it is hard with a rough brown exterior and smooth white interior.

Halloumi / Χαλλούμι PDO

Halloumi PDO is a white semi-hard, un-ripened, cheese that is made from cow, sheep, or goat's milk, in Cyprus.

Tolminc PDO

Tolminc PDO is a hard, full fat cheese made from raw or thermised cow’s milk. It takes its name from the city of Tolmin, situated in the high Isonzo Valley (Zgornje Posočje), in the northwest of Slovenia.

Kiwi Latina PDO

Kiwi Latina PDO is a fresh fruit produced in the provinces of Latina and Rome in Italy. Like other kiwis, it is oval, with a brown hairy exterior, and green flesh inside which is dotted with small black seeds. It has a characteristic acidic sweet flavour and a fruity aroma.

Connemara Hill Lamb / Uain Sléibhe Chonamara PDO

Connemara Hill Lamb / Uain Sléibhe Chonamara PDO is lamb bred, born and reared on the mountainous terrain of Connemara in the West of Ireland where it feed on herbs, heathers and grasses unique to the region.

Eisenberg PDO

Eisenberg – which translates as Iron Mountain – is a wine growing region close to the Hungarian border in southeast Austria that stretches about 30 kilometres from north to south and only has around 515 hectares of vineyards in total. Its wine has come to distinguish itself among the world’s greatest. Red wine from the Blaufränkisch grape is the best known from the Eisenberg region and is characterised by a particularly earthy mineral spice, and a peppery flavour.

Pregler / Osttiroler Pregler PDO

Pregler PDO is a fruit brandy or schnapps made from local apples and pears. It comes from the Osttirol region of Austria and is produced exclusively in distilleries in the ‘Lienz’ region. The schnapps is clear and colourless and has a sweet fruity flavour.

Rodi Ermionis / Ρόδι Ερμιόνης PDO

Rodi Ermionis PDO is a variety of pomegranate from the Ermionida region in Greece. The fruit is round and the colour of the peel varies from pale yellow, pink to red. Inside, it has pink seeds that are soft and chewy. The fruit itself is sweet and juicy.

Protected geographical indication (PGI)

PGI covers EU agricultural food products closely linked to a specific geographical area. At least one of the stages of production, processing or preparation takes place in the area.

Gornooryahovski sudzhuk PGI

Gornooryahovski sudzhuk PGI, or known simply as sudzhuk, is premium traditional dried beef sausage from Bulgaria. It is brown in colour and has a mosaic or marbled pattern running through it. The sausage has a distinct spicy flavour derived from a traditional recipe of black pepper, cumin and savory (a strong pepper flavoured herb,) combined with raw ground beef.

Danablu PGI

Danablu PGI (Danish Blue Cheese) is a semi-soft, light, creamy blue cheese that can only be produced in Denmark from Danish milk and at approved dairies. It is white to ivory in colour with blue and green threads created by mould.

Jambon d’Ardenne PGI

Jambon d’Ardenne PGI is a dry ham which takes its name from the Ardenne region of Belgium. The ham is deep brownish pink in colour and has a salty and spicy taste.

Jihoceská Zlatá Niva PGI

Jihoceská Zlatá Niva PGI is a marbled cheese from the South Bohemia region of Czechia. It is made from processed cow’s milk. It is wheel shaped with a rind that is marked by washing or by rubbing, with a cream to light brown coloured surface. The cheese itself varies in colour from cream white to butter, with a green-bluish marbling and visible cross signs. The texture is pasty.

Budějovické Pivo PGI

Budějovické pivo PGI, or beer from Budějovické, is a pale lager beer from the South Bohemia region of Czechia. The beer is a deep golden colour, with a white head or foam top.

Edam Holland PGI

Edam Holland PGI cheese is a semi-soft cow’s milk cheese usually made according to a Dutch recipe that dates back centuries to the 1300s at least. It is recognisable by its red rind, made of paraffin wax, used to protect it during transportation. The cheese itself is pale yellow in colour.

Gouda Holland PGI

Gouda Holland PGI cheese from the Netherlands is an aromatic cheese that can be mild or intense, depending on its age. The older the cheese variety, the stronger and saltier it gets. A young cheese has a maturation process of approximately a month whereas as mature cheese will have a maturation process closer to a year. It is traditionally made from unpasteurised cow’s milk and coated in a yellow wax that prevents it from drying out during its maturation.

Slovenská bryndza PGI

Slovenská bryndza PGI is a sheep’s cheese from Slovakia. It is white, tangy, crumbly, and slightly moist, with a sharp flavour and salty finish, similar to the taste of feta.

Kranjska Klobasa PGI

Kranjska klobasa PGI, or Carniolan sausage, is a small Slovenian sausage made from pork, garlic, salt, and pepper, that find its origins in the times of the Austro-Hungarian empire. The sausage is smoked and cured and held together with a wooden skewer. It is a reddish-brown colour on the surface and has a faint scent of smoke.

Havarti PGI

Havarti PGI is a semi-soft cheese from Denmark made with cow’s milk and dotted with small holes. It is rindless, smooth, and slightly bright-surfaced with a cream to yellow colour depending on type. Its taste and aroma are buttery, but the taste can vary from slightly acidic to very sweet. The older the cheese, the saltier the taste with more of a hazelnut flavour.

Skånsk spettkaka PGI

Skånsk spettkaka PGI is a beautiful conical or pyramid shaped cake from Scania, Sweden. It is traditionally made using only fresh eggs, sugar, and potato flour.

Jamón Serrano PGI

Jamón Serrano PGI is a Spanish dry-cured ham made from the cerdo blanco, a race of white pig native to Spain. It has broad strips of pink meat alongside strips of pure white fat, with no marbling.

Cerise des coteaux du Ventoux PGI

Cerise des coteaux du Ventoux PGI are handpicked cherries from the foothills of the Mont Ventoux Mountain in southern France. The cherries are deep red in colour and are quite large in size – at least 24mm.

Jagnięcina Podhalańska PGI

Jagnięcina podhalańska PGI is lamb produced from three specific breeds of sheep: Polish mountain sheep, coloured mountain sheep and Podhale zackels.

Kaimiškas Jovarų Alus PGI

Kaimiškas Jovarų alus PGI, or rustic beer, is a naturally fermented farmhouse ale from Lithuania. It ranges in colour, from golden yellow to amber. This complex and full-flavoured beer has a strong nutty and malty flavour and is bitter in taste. Kaimiškas is made with a unique yeast that is only found in this area.

Kiwi de Corse PGI

Kiwi de Corse PGI is a French variety of hand picked kiwi fruit which comes from small orchards in the Haute-Corse region of Corsica. The fruit is oval, has brown hairy skin, and when opened has bright green flesh dotted with tiny black seeds.

Pollo y Capón del Prat PGI

Pollo y Capón del Prat PGI is chicken from Catalonia's native Prat breed. Traditionally raised in a small area southeast of Barcelona, these chickens and capons are not only valued for their succulent meat but also for their good-sized eggs.

Vadehavsstude PGI

Vadehavsstude PGI is fresh beef meat specifically from the Wadden Sea islands in the Jutland region of Denmark. The meat come from young cattle from the Holstein breed, making it more tender, fragrant, and succulent than standard beef, with a slightly saltier flavour.

Westlandse Druif PGI

Westlandse druif PGI are grapes from the Westland region of South Holland in the Netherlands. A small oval-shaped fruit, the colour ranges from deep blue to a whitish green. They have a distinctive aroma and are renowned for their shapely clusters ; the flesh is juicy and firm, with a fresh, sweet taste.

The European from farm to fork food safety model

Food safety legislation

The European Union’s laws and standards are harmonised and mandatory for all EU countries, but also apply to imported and exported goods. The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) supports EU policymakers with scientific advice on food safety issues.

Food safety controls

The effectiveness of the legislation is ensured through food safety controls at 3 levels: European, national and business-operator level. In addition to controls, the EU also provides trainings to food authorities to make sure that all standards and regulations are applied correctly.

Consumer information

The European model also promotes an active dialogue with consumers through consumer information. All European citizens have the right to know how the food they eat is produced, processed, packaged, labelled and sold. Mandatory food labelling gives consumers clear information about the food on their plates and helps them to make healthy food choices.

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EU quality scheme and organic label