On Tuesday, the Chamber of Deputies adopted a bill on the labeling of agro-food products with the designation “De Origine Romania – DOR” that use the main raw materials of Romanian origin in the production process and meet certain conditions.

The project envisages the creation of a voluntary certification scheme “De Origine Romania – DOR” accessible to Romanian producers and processors, a scheme that would guarantee the fact that the purchased food product is manufactured in Romania and made with raw materials of Romanian origin.

According to the adopted laws, the law establishes a voluntary certification scheme “De Origine Romania – DOR” to support the promotion of Romanian agri-food products.

The scheme will be applied in accordance with the notification procedure provided for in Directive (EU) 2015/1535 on the procedure for providing information in the field of technical regulations and rules for information society services.

In addition, the scheme will be applied throughout Romania for the labeling of agri-food products, the production of which uses the main raw materials of Romanian origin and which meets the requirements set out in the law.

“To benefit from voluntary labeling, an agri-food product must meet the following specific characteristics:

a) in the case of unprocessed products, the production, rearing or reproduction, including harvesting and milking, in the case of cows, sheep and goats, must take place in the territory of Romania;

b) in the case of meat, it must also be obtained from animals born, reared and slaughtered on the territory of Romania;

c) in the case of products of animal origin, in addition to meat, they must also be obtained from animals raised on the territory of Romania;

d) in the case of processed products, their manufacture will be carried out from unprocessed products, in the composition of which it is allowed to use in the amount of up to 25% of their mass, according to the recipe, some ingredients that cannot be used. replaced by similar ingredients produced in Romania.

The normative act also provides that the competent body responsible for the implementation of the scheme is the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, which will create, in this sense, the national register of the voluntary certification scheme “De Origine Romania” – a document in digital form. format with all beneficiaries who received a DOR certificate.

In order to benefit from this scheme, applicants must submit to the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development a file containing: the producer’s certificate; specifications containing photos and specific characteristics of each agro-food product, ingredients, form, packaging method, technological process; request for voluntary certification of the “De Origine Romania – DOR” type; self-responsible declaration certifying the origin of the main ingredient; a self-responsible declaration regarding the territory where each product for which certification and registration is required is produced and/or processed; the list of products for which certification and registration is required; permit or sanitary-veterinary registration number for the place where agro-food products are produced and/or processed, for which certification and registration are required.

The beneficiaries of the scheme will use the “De Origine Romania – DOR” logo.

The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development will appoint representatives to periodically review the beneficiaries’ compliance with the scheme and report on this.

Starting from 2024, the Ministry of Agriculture will provide financial resources from its own budget to promote the voluntary certification scheme “De Origine Romania – DOR” in the country and abroad.

Within 30 days from the date of entry into force of this law, the Government, upon submission of the Ministry of Agrarian Policy, will approve the methodical rules of application by its decision.

The Chamber of Deputies is the decision-making body (Agerpres).