ITALIAN producers were dealt a blow yesterday after an adviser to the European Union's highest court rejected complaints about German-made cheese sold as "parmesan".
Many Italians consider foreign versions unworthy of the name, but in a ruling at the European Court of Justice, Advocate General Jan Mazak, said that the European Commission's demand to stop Germany allowing non-Italian cheeses sold locally to be labelled as "parmesan" should be thrown out of court.
Parmesan, a hard crumbly cheese sprinkled on pasta or eaten in chunks with balsamic vinegar, comes from northern Italy where cheesemakers have been fighting to protect their product from what they consider to be lower quality imitations.
The European Commission, supported by the Italian government, has argued that Germany should not have allowed non-Italian cheese to be labelled "parmesan".
Germany, Europe's second-largest producer of the cheese after Italy, said "parmesan" had become a generic term over the centuries for grated hard cheese and entirely unrelated to the specific Italian product made in northern Italy's Parma region.
The opinions of the court's advocates general are upheld by the full court in most cases. The European Court of Justice is due to rule on the case later this year.
Only "Parmigiano Reggiano" had EU protection, it said, and "Parmigiano" on its own - or any translation - had become generic and was therefore unprotected.
In 2002, the court ruled that the makers of a dried mixture of grated cheese could no longer market it as "parmesan".
Mr Mazak said Germany should not have to remove the name "parmesan" from cheeses that were made outside Parma.
The original Italian name, along with the specific geographical origin and manufacturing process, won legal protection across the European Union in 1996.
And Italy's parmesan makers, in the Consorzio del Formaggio Parmigiano-Reggiano, plan to fight on.
The organisation's president, Giuseppe Alai, said: "We are looking forward to the confirmation by the judges that the word parmesan is not generic and that it is reserved to Italian producers."