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GI registration guide

How a farmer group registers a Geographical Indication, and how a grower inside an existing one becomes an authorised user.

Most growers whose crop already carries a GI have never registered as authorised users, which means they cannot legally use the tag that their own produce qualifies for. That is the cheaper of the 2 routes below and it is the one most people should read first.

If your crop already has a GI

Check the GI tag directory first. If your crop is registered and your land falls inside the registered area, you are not applying for a new GI. You are registering as an authorised user of one that exists.

  1. Find out which body holds the registration. It is normally a growers association, a board or a state department, and the register names it.
  2. Ask that body what it needs from a grower. Proof that your land is inside the area is always part of it.
  3. File the authorised user application through the GI Registry, usually with the registered proprietor supporting it.
  4. Once approved, you may use the tag on what you sell, and that is what the premium attaches to.

If your crop has no GI yet

  1. Form or find the applicant. An individual farmer cannot hold a GI. It is held by an association of growers, a producer organisation, a board or a government body on behalf of everyone in the area.
  2. Define the area precisely. The application stands or falls on the boundary, because the boundary is what the tag protects.
  3. Write the statement of case. What the product is, how it is grown or made, and why the place is the reason it is different. This is the heart of the application and it usually takes expert help.
  4. Set the standards and the inspection. How a buyer can tell the real thing, and who checks. An application with no inspection plan is weak.
  5. File with the GI Registry with the fee, and expect examination, objections from anyone who disagrees, and publication in the GI Journal before registration.
  6. After registration, enrol the growers as authorised users. A registered GI with no authorised users protects nobody.

Worth knowing before you start

  • This takes years, not months, and it needs money for expert drafting. Most successful applications are backed by a state department or a research institute.
  • Your agricultural university or your state horticulture department has usually done this before and is the cheapest help you will find.
  • A GI protects a place, not a brand. It does not stop anyone inside the area from using it, and it is not a trademark.
  • The premium is not guaranteed. What a GI does is make the premium defensible, and the premium page shows what the mandi data says about that.

The official register and the forms are with the GI Registry. See the official list.