Models to aid studies on territory delimitation for Brazilian geographical indications

Abstract

A geographical indication (GI) seal granted to a product certifies its territorial origin as well as the link between its quality and human and natural characteristics of its production environment (terroir). An existing challenge in the process of setting up a GI for a product is delimiting the geographic area that properly represents the terroir and generates the expected territorial development after the grant of this protection seal. This article presents tools that can contribute to studies on the delimitation of the territory of GIs in Brazil. Through a bibliographic search, we compared models for delineating GI areas compared with the standards used for this purpose in Brazilian GIs. Our findings show that the process of delimiting GI areas ​​in Brazil is different for each type of indication, and distinct characteristics are also present in each type of GI intended, whether it be an Indication of Source or a Denomination of Origin. Only two of the analyzed models exhibited structures close to these characteristics, so they are recommended to aid studies on the delimitation of the area of Brazilian GIs. However, they cannot be used as a standard to this end.