Appeal brought on 29 April 2024 by Papouis Dairies LTD and others against the judgment of the General Court (Tenth Chamber) delivered on 21 February 2024 in Case T-361/21, Papouis Dairies and others v Commission

(Case C-314/24 P)

Language of the case: English

Parties

Appellants: Papouis Dairies LTD, Pagkyprios organismos ageladotrofon (POA) Dimosia LTD, Pagkypria Organosi Ageladotrofon, E. Gavrielides Oy, Neomax Sales SRL and FFF Fine Foods Pty Ltd (represented by: A. Pomares Caballero, M. Pomares Caballero, abogados and N. Korogiannakis, dikigoros)

Other parties to the proceedings: European Commission, Republic of Cyprus

Form of order sought

The appellants claim that the Court should:

set aside of the judgment under appeal;

decide upon the pleas of annulment;

annul Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2021/591¹ of 12 April 2021 entering a name in the register of protected designations of origin and protected geographical indications (‘Χαλλούμι’ (Halloumi)/‘Hellim’ (PDO)) including and as modified by the three amendments;

order the Commission to pay the legal costs of the appellants;

subsidiarily, refer the case to the GC.

Pleas in law and main arguments

The General Court infringed Article 86 of the Rules of the Procedure of the General Court, Article 263 of the TFEU, as well as Article 53(2) of the Regulation (EU) No 1151/2012¹ on quality schemes for agricultural products and foodstuffs, read in conjunction with Article 6b of Delegated Regulation (EU) No 664/2014² and Article 10a of Implementing Regulation (EU) No 668/2014³ , by declaring the applicants’ request to adapt the pleas were inadmissible and by declaring that the Commission shall not review the content of standard amendments to a protected designation of origin (PDO) communicated to it by a Member State and does not exercise any decision-making power in proceeding with their publication, and therefore, the publication of the standard amendments is not an act of the Commission that may be challenged before the EU Courts.

The General Court infringed Article 41(1) of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights by not considering that, in absolute terms, a 10-year period for the registration of a PDO is excessive and by declaring that it is only where the elapsing of an excessive period of time is likely to affect the very content of the decision adopted at the end of the administrative procedure that failure to observe the reasonable time principle affects the validity of that procedure.

The General Court infringed Articles 50(1), 51 and 52(3)(b) of Regulation (EU) No 1151/2012 as well as Article 296 of the TFEU and Article 41(1) of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights, by declaring that the Commission is not required to rule expressly on all of the arguments put forward by the persons who lodged reasoned statements of opposition against the registration of a PDO and by concluding that the Commission, in the assessment following the oppositions filed at the EU stage of the procedure, had limited discretion, i.e. to check that the factual information contained in the application for registration of the PDO was not tainted with manifest errors.

The General Court infringed Articles 50(1) and 52(3)(b), in connection with Articles 5(1) and 7, of Regulation (EU) No 1151/2012 as well as Article 263 of the TFEU, by declaring that one acknowledged error plus four other possible errors that, in any case, would not be considered manifest, all of them related to the section link of a PDO specification, do not suffice to establish that the Commission failed to carry out a proper examination of the application for registration of a PDO.

The General Court infringed Articles 5(1), 6(1), 7(1), 10 and 50 of Regulation (EU) No 1151/2012 by declaring that the fact that, on the date when the Commission takes a decision to register a PDO, only a limited proportion of the products covered by the name proposed for registration are produced in accordance with the specification does not by itself justify a refusal to register that name.

The General Court infringed the principle of good administration by concluding that the Commission did not have the obligation to wait for the outcome of the proceedings pending before the national Court before registering a PDO, and by concluding that the annulment of the administrative decision favourable to the registration of the PDO by the national Court does not automatically entail annulment of the subsequent Commission Implementing Regulation ordering registration of that PDO.

____________

¹ OJ 2021, L 125, p. 42.

¹ Regulation (EU) No 1151/2012 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 21 November 2012 on quality schemes for agricultural products and foodstuffs (OJ 2012, L 343, p. 1).

¹ Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) No 664/2014 of 18 December 2013 supplementing Regulation (EU) No 1151/2012 of the European Parliament and of the Council with regard to the establishment of the Union symbols for protected designations of origin, protected geographical indications and traditional specialities guaranteed and with regard to certain rules on sourcing, certain procedural rules and certain additional transitional rules (OJ 2014, L 179, p. 17).

¹ Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) No 668/2014 of 13 June 2014 laying down rules for the application of Regulation (EU) No 1151/2012 of the European Parliament and of the Council on quality schemes for agricultural products and foodstuffs (OJ 2014, L 179, p. 36).