Primary agricultural production, viticulture and the wine production industry, grapevine cultivation, and the production of wine and products made from grapes

Decree No 88/2017 implementing provisions of the Act on viticulture and wine production

The submitted draft decree amends and refines conditions given by Act No 321/2004 on viticulture and wine production and on amendments to certain related acts (the Viticulture and Wine Production Act), as amended.

Based on amendments to the Viticulture and Wine Production Act, the following were added in particular:

• regulation of the import of unpackaged wines, accompanying documents for the transport of wine products in the Czech Republic, and record-keeping of wine products;

• sampling of unpackaged wines and their analysis; and

• use of a newly introduced logo for marking wines with PGI and PDO.

Simultaneously, EU law notes that especially unpackaged, more precisely barrel wine, is susceptible to tampering or intervention that can be considered wine fraud (see recital 32 of Commission Regulation (EC) No 436/2009). Inspection of an unpackaged product in refillable containers is more complicated, especially with respect to record-keeping. Existing legislation does not at all regulate placing this type of wine into circulation.

Keywords:

List of varieties, synonyms, abbreviations, quality wine, provincial wine, barrel wine, wine, effervescent wine, sparkling wine, aromatised wine, aromatised wine beverage, aromatised wine cocktail, low-alcohol wine, alcohol-free wine, by-products, quality, physical requirements, chemical requirements, olfactory requirements, process losses, analyses, deadlines, diseases, defects, traditional expressions, product labelling, sampling, accompanying document, transport, record-keeping, registers, supplies, certification, logo.

The proposed legislation is related to the following directly applicable EU legislation:

- Regulation (EU) No 1308/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 17 December 2013 establishing a common organisation of the markets in agricultural products and repealing Council Regulations (EEC) No 922/72, (EEC) No 234/79, (EC) No 1037/2001 and (EC) No 1234/2007;

- Commission Regulation (EC) No 555/2008 of 27 June 2008 laying down detailed rules for implementing Council Regulation (EC) No 479/2008 on the common organisation of the market in wine as regards support programmes, trade with third countries, production potential and on controls in the wine sector;

- Commission Regulation (EC) No 436/2009 of 26 May 2009 laying down detailed rules for the application of Council Regulation (EC) No 479/2008 as regards the vineyard register, compulsory declarations and the gathering of information to monitor the wine market, the documents accompanying consignments of wine products and the wine sector registers to be kept, as amended;

- Commission Regulation (EC) No 606/2009 of 10 July 2009 laying down certain detailed rules for implementing Council Regulation (EC) No 479/2008 as regards the categories of grapevine products, oenological practices and the applicable restrictions;

- Commission Regulation (EC) No 607/2009 of 14 July 2009 laying down certain detailed rules for the implementation of Council Regulation (EC) No 479/2008 as regards protected designations of origin and geographical indications, traditional terms, labelling and presentation of certain wine sector products, as amended;

- Regulation (EU) No 251/2014 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 26 February 2014 on the definition, description, presentation, labelling and the protection of geographical indications of aromatised wine products and repealing Council Regulation (EEC) No 1601/91;

- Commission Regulation (EC) No 436/2009 of 26 May 2009 laying down detailed rules for the application of Council Regulation (EC) No 479/2008 as regards the vineyard register, compulsory declarations and the gathering of information to monitor the wine market, the documents accompanying consignments of wine products and the wine sector registers to be kept;

- Regulation (EU) No 1169/2011 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 25 October 2011 on the provision of food information to consumers, amending Regulations (EC) No 1924/2006 and (EC) No 1925/2006 of the European Parliament and of the Council, and repealing Commission Directive 87/250/EEC, Council Directive 90/496/EEC, Commission Directive 1999/10/EC, Directive 2000/13/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council, Commission Directives 2002/67/EC and 2008/5/EC and Commission Regulation (EC) No 608/2004 (Text with EEA relevance);

- Directive (EU) 2015/1535 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 9 September 2015 laying down a procedure for the provision of information in the field of technical regulations and of rules on Information Society services (codification) (Text with EEA relevance).

The draft decree fully complies with EU law and international treaties by which the Czech Republic is bound.

It does not run contrary to EU case law, and complies with the general principles of EU law (e.g. the principles of legal certainty, proportionality and non-discrimination).