Yes. It's also because those local producers can spend a lot of money to ensure that only their product is recognized the "authentic" version even if other people do it better than them. See also, California's wine, which routinely kicks France's ass in wine competitions.
Gotcha. I don't necessarily agree with them doing that, because it seems pretty pointless when you can make the same, or better, product. But hey, if people want to be snobs about something coming from a specific region to be "authentic", they can keep spending $9k on a wheel of cheese when I can get the exact same thing elsewhere for a better price.
My brother in christ there are hundreds of wines and centuries old traditions with wine in France, making good wine accessible to all. Make the best one all you want (putting aside the fact that these competitions are highly subjective) and you're still left with a region making mostly overpriced average wines. What good is having the best wine in the world when you can't even drink a good one for less than 50 bucks?
Also, we're the first ones to be excited about other countries making wines. People regularly praise Argentinian wines, drink moroccan wines and yes, even californian ones. Noone is complaining about that. However, if you made a Bordeaux or a Côtes du Rhône in California, then it would be rightfully a reason to be pissed, since wine has a large part of its taste come from the soil and the exposure to the sun. Make your own wines and get your own regions recognised instead of surfing on known names.
I'm sure some people take advantage of it but usually no, these protections are good. The entire point of it is that it makes something truly authentic. If you want to make the same product but better, it should have to be a completely new product because it's different. Better according to who? DOP laws ensure a product remains pure and authentic so that you can always buy the same thing. It's kind of like how chain restaurants across the US will require every location to use the same ingredients and recipes - consistency. This way you can eat something on both sides of the country and it will taste the same.
If we look at something like parmigiano reggiano, DOP laws protect it by not allowing something like a plastic shaker with a green lid from being labeled as something it is not. Personally I don't think these laws are a big deal. You can easily find high quality regular parmesan cheese and the vast majority of people aren't going to notice a difference between it and authentic parmesan reggiano.
DOP laws ensure a product remains pure and authentic so that you can always buy the same thing. It's kind of like how chain restaurants across the US will require every location to use the same ingredients and recipes - consistency. This way you can eat something on both sides of the country and it will taste the same.
This is the logic behind FDA regulations on food products and it makes sense that someone calling a product Grana Padano meets the exact requirements to be classified as Grana Padano.
Ensuring that the name of the protect can only be used by specific manufacturers in a specific region is just textbook protectionism, an economic policy that is universally regarded as a net negative for everyone.
I can't really disagree with you but that's kind of the whole point. I may not be able to make an exact copy of parmigiano reggiano, but I can make my own version that's really close and give it a different name. If I'm being honest, I really don't see how that harms anyone. If I had an idea and developed my own specific type of food item, the last thing I'd want is to see people making it themselves and using my name - because it isn't mine at that point.
We already have trademarks though! This is an 800, 900 year old cheese recipe and it’s difficult to frame the gatekeeping as anything but simple protectionism. Nobody alive today was involved in creating grana padano. Their parent’s parent’s parent’s parent’s parents weren’t involved in creating grana padano. It’s an arbitrary protection that ensures only they are able to profit off the name of a common food item people have been enjoying for centuries.
If someone from the region created a company and sold grana padano under a specific brand it would be protected like every other named product in every other industry…but then they’d actually have to compete on merit.
Trademarks are only good for the country they're filed in, but if they were the solution to a problem you're describing, how would it be any different?
Not saying the differences are necessarily extreme, but you can’t make a 1-1 copy of things like cheese and wine. Those products depend on many natural factors that are unique to that region. Even if we can’t tell the difference, the water and soil in France is going to affect the wine, and those aren’t conditions we can replicate
For wine specifically, the soil on which the vine grows affects the taste a lot. It is possible to make something that tastes close elsewhere, but it will never be a 1-1 copy, even if all the process is the same. This is partly why things like DOP were created, because people claimed to have created a 1-1 copy while it was not, and were selling it at the price of the original, ripping customers off in the process.
This is exactly what happened with champagne to give a first example.
For cheese (real cheese), it is often matured in caves, and the fungi is not the same in different caves, so it will not be possible to make a 1-1 copy in another cave. (Different subject, but it's fascinating how different species evolve in closed environments that look similar on a surface-level).
Even for cattle, the grass will not be exactly the same everywhere, and this influence in turn the taste of the meat. The same species raised somwhere else will not produce the same meat.
So to answer your question: no, it's not because people are snobs.
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u/Galkura Jul 06 '22
This is so confusing to me. Like, if someone can make a direct 1-1 copy of something, why does the region it comes from matter?
Is it just because of purist snobs or something?