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Our View: No end in sight to the tortuous halloumi saga

scheme for cheesemakers with stockpiles of halloumi announced

JUST over a year ago, the government was celebrating because the European Commission finally registered halloumi as a protected designation of origin (PDO). The registration had waited for years because of objections raised by the Cyprus government itself related to Cyprus problem concerns. Who would certify the PDO of Turkish Cypriot hellim, which was also covered, and if this were an external body, would this not be a downgrading of the Republic?

While the foreign ministry, in typical style, turned halloumi into a major political issue, threatening the status of the Republic, everyone ignored the real problem, about which producers had been warning for years – the milk content. The agriculture ministry officials handling the PDO file paid no attention to the producers. They felt the lowering of the percentage of cow’s milk would drastically reduce output, because of the limited supply of sheep and goat’s milk that should eventually make up 51 per cent of the milk content. Currently we are in a transition period, and it is 25 per cent.

Producers also warned that halloumi made from cow’s milk had a milder flavour than that which contained sheep and goat’s milk and was what consumers abroad were used to. Given that the cheese has become a big export earner – in the region of €200 million a year – it would be criminal to drastically change the taste by altering the milk content, argued the producers. The PDO, with the specifications proposed by the agriculture ministry, instead of protecting halloumi exports would undermine them.

After the PDO was registered, meetings of all interested parties were called to discuss changing the milk content in the specs as if this were possible. These meetings were intended to appease the halloumi producers, as changes of substance could not be made to the PDO file. Having created this complete mess that will hurt the producers and the economy, the authorities have decided to turn a blind eye to what is happening.

The chairman of the House agriculture committee Yiannakis Gavriel accused ministries of not implementing the law, by not checking the milk content of halloumi produced. Producers told a committee meeting on Tuesday that they did not comply with the PDO specs on milk content because they did not want to, said Gavriel. Now, ludicrously, the agriculture ministry has written to the attorney-general to ask for clarifications about 11 points in the PDO file! Should these clarifications not have been requested before registering the PDO, or is this being used as an excuse to do nothing?

Having created the mess with the specs of PDO file it appears that the government is now pretending the problem does not exist, by refusing to deal with it. For how much longer it will be able to turn a blind eye to the non-compliance with the PDO specs remains to be seen.

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