EU clamps down on meat names for plant-based and cultivated alternatives

The EU has adopted new rules reserving certain meat names for products that are exclusively derived from those meats at all stages of marketing. The move ends a period of doubt as to whether the proposal would progress after talks between the European Parliament and the Council broke down in December last year.

The European Parliament and Council negotiators' agreement was adopted as a regulation that forms part of a broader package aimed at strengthening farmers' contractual position in the food supply chain. The new rules give farmers a stronger negotiating position in the agrifood value chain and, as part of this, protect the denominations of meat and certain meat products with the aim of increasing consumer transparency and fair competition.

What has changed?

The Commission's original proposal sought to ban 31 meat-related terms, including "beef," "pork," "chicken," "chop" and "bacon", from being used on products not derived from animals. The European Parliament had sought to extend the ban further, adding terms such as "steak," "escalope," "sausage" and "burger", which would have significantly widened the scope of the ban, but was ultimately unsuccessful.

The final regulation establishes protection for the term "meat", defined as "edible parts of animals", and the following meat-related names: beef, veal, pork, poultry, chicken, turkey, duck, goose, lamb, mutton, ovine, goat, drumstick, tenderloin, sirloin, flank, loin, steak, ribs, shoulder, shank, chop, wing, breast, liver, thigh, brisket, ribeye, T-bone, rump and bacon.

These terms will be reserved exclusively for meat products and therefore will not be able to be used for any product that does not contain meat, for example, plant-based alternatives. The regulation also explicitly excludes cell-cultured or lab-grown products from using these terms.

The narrower scope of the final regulation means that it will still be possible to use terms such as "sausage" and "burger" for non-meat products. Accordingly, "veggie burgers" and "vegan sausages" will remain on European supermarket shelves. 

Proposed expansion

Despite the narrower scope of the final regulations, the European Parliament's Agriculture Committee on 2 September examined a new amendment to expand the list of reserved terms. The amendment seeks to reserve "burger," "hamburger," "sausage," "chorizo," "salami," "pepperoni," "mortadella," "ham," "meat ball," "minced meat," "patty," "nugget," "escalope," "schnitzel," "lardon," "meat loaf," "black pudding," "white pudding," "pastrami," "fillet" and "liver" for meat products, going well beyond the terms previously debated.

Industry groups have expressed opposition to the proposed amendment on grounds that further restrictions would have commercial implications for businesses across the food sector including manufacturers and farmers, and create uncertainty for the consumer.

What next?

The regulation entered into force on 18 August; however, there will be a three-year transitional period, meaning that the ban will not take effect until 19 August 2029. It will be possible to continue to sell products that do not conform to the new designations that were produced in, or imported into, the EU before 19 August 2029 until stocks are exhausted or until 19 August 2032.

Rapporteur Céline Imart hailed the deal as a big win for livestock farmers, stressing that the ban applies to meat names for lab-grown products as well as hinting at future common agricultural policy reforms that could further expand protection further. 

The UK position also warrants attention. The forthcoming UK-EU sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) agreement, which is expected to take effect by mid-2027, envisages elements of dynamic regulatory alignment, which could extend to labelling. The Food Standards Agency has told stakeholders that UK businesses may be required to follow the EU rules under the SPS agreement. 

If the newly proposed amendments tabled in the Parliament's Agriculture Committee were to be adopted, they would allow individual member states to introduce additional national protective measures for other meat-related designations. This could potentially have the effect of fragmenting the single market, and quite how this would be accommodated in any UK-EU SPS agreement remains to be seen.

Food law v trade mark law

Unlike in the UK, the EU trade mark regulation does not contain a provision preventing trade marks from being registered where they are contrary to another piece of legislation. Under the EU regulation, a trade mark cannot be registered if, among other things, it is of "such a nature as to deceive the public". 

There have been a small number of decisions where trade marks incorporating meat-related names have been found to be deceptive, but such terms are used in marks routinely registered at the EU Intellectual Property Office. The new regulation dealing with meat names does not touch on the issue of intellectual property or trade mark law specifically and therefore it seems likely that a difference in how the terms are treated in food law versus trade mark law will emerge in the EU.

How the UK proceeds in light of this regulation and the SPS agreement will need to be watched carefully, as the UK legislation does contain a provision preventing trade marks from being registered where they are contrary to another law. This was the case in the recent Dairy UK v Oatly decision, where the Supreme Court confirmed that regulated terms such as "milk" could not be used for plant-based products, including as part of a trade mark. If the UK follows the EU in banning these terms, it could have significant implications for trade mark holders and applicants in the UK.

Osborne Clarke comment

Although the regulation brings some welcome clarity for plant-based food businesses, uncertainty remains over whether the reserved terms will be expanded and whether member state variation may fragment the single market. 

The current exclusion of terms like "burger" and "sausage" from the reserved list will come as a relief to many non-meat producers. These are category descriptors that consumers readily associate with plant-based products and which carry real commercial value. However, the loss of terms like "steak," "bacon" and "chicken" for plant-based alternatives will require producers to review their existing product names and labelling and update their branding strategies moving forward.

Cultivated meat products are not yet on the EU market. Businesses will need to reconsider how they name their products before launch to ensure they comply with the ban given that it explicitly excludes the use of the reserved meat-related terminology for cultivated meat products.

Businesses selling plant-based or cultivated products in the EU, or those whose UK products may be subject to SPS alignment, and would do well to monitor the process and begin assessing what labelling changes may be required. 

If you would like to discuss how these developments affect your business, please get in touch with your usual Osborne Clarke contact.