EN Official Journal of the European Union C 296/9

Publication of an application pursuant to Article 6(2) of Council Regulation (EC) No 510/2006 on the protection of geographical indications and designations of origin for agricultural products and foodstuffs

2012/C 296/08

This publication confers the right to object to the application pursuant to Article 7 of Council Regulation (EC) No 510/2006 (1). Statements of objection must reach the Commission within six months of the date of this publication.

SINGLE DOCUMENT

COUNCIL REGULATION (EC) No 510/2006

‘FRAISES DE NÎMES’

EC No: FR-PGI-0005-0809-02.06.2010

PGI ( X ) PDO ( )

1. Name:

‘Fraises de Nîmes’

2. Member State or Third Country:

France

3. Description of the agricultural product or foodstuff:

3.1. Type of product:

Class 1.6: Fruit, vegetables and cereals, fresh or processed

3.2. Description of product to which the name in point 1 applies:

‘Fraises de Nîmes’ are presented fresh.

The fruit is healthy, without deformities, bright and unsoiled. The fruit must have a minimum sugar content of 7,5 % Brix and its colour at harvest must be homogenous.

The fruit must have a fresh and green peduncle and calyx.

Marketed fruit are arranged in layers, regardless of the type of packaging (punnet, tray).

‘Fraises de Nîmes’ must be marketed in the ‘Extra’ or ‘I’ class.

Each batch must contain fruit of a uniform size of at least 18 mm.

‘Fraises de Nîmes’ stem from varieties listed by the applicant group.

The applicant group, together with the Centre Technique Interprofessionnel de Fruits et Légumes of Balandran, has so far selected two varieties:

— ‘Ciflorette’,

— ‘Gariguette’.

Producers must use certified seedlings.

By improving the plants and through varietal selection it must be possible to create new strawberry varieties whose gustatory qualities exceed those of existing varieties. Therefore, a procedure for introducing new varieties eligible for the ‘Fraises de Nîmes’ PGI has been established.

The varieties are chosen according to the following criteria:

— early varieties,

— gustatory qualities based, in particular, on the sugar content,

— oblong shape,

— keeping quality,

— resistance to diseases, in particular oidium,

— varieties for which the total hours of cold necessary for the buds to break dormancy is approximately the same (700 to 900 hours).

Harvesting takes place every other day at the beginning of the marketing year and thereafter every day.

‘Fraises de Nîmes’ are delivered at the latest on the day following their harvest.

3.3. Raw materials (for processed products only):

Not applicable.

3.4. Feed (for products of animal origin only):

Not applicable.

3.5. Specific steps in production that must take place in the defined geographical area:

‘Fraises de Nîmes’ must be grown and harvested in the geographical area.

3.6. Specific rules concerning slicing, grating, packaging, etc.:

The strawberries are packaged in punnets or trays and must always be arranged in layers.

The strawberries are picked and put directly into the consumer unit (punnets or trays holding 2 kg of ‘Fraises de Nîmes’ PGI) at the edge of the field in order to limit handling.

The packaging of the fruit consists in verifying the weight of the consumer units, labelling them, placing the fruit in the tray and putting in place a system of traceability.

The strawberries must be wrapped and packaged in the defined geographical area to limit the handling of this fragile product, as excessive handling would damage its quality and keeping quality.

The producer is also the packager, as this keeps the handling of the strawberries to a minimum.

3.7. Specific rules on labelling:

The labels affixed to the consumer units must include the following:

— the minimum labelling information required by law,

— the name of the protected geographical indication: ‘Fraises de Nîmes’,

— an insert with the name and address of the certifying body (Qualité-France), preceded by the words ‘Certified by:’.

The European Union’s PGI logo is mandatory on the punnets and trays.

4. Concise definition of the geographical area:

The geographical area of the ‘Fraises de Nîmes’ PGI is located in the département du Gard in Languedoc-Roussillon.

It is characterised principally by the geological unit formed by the Plateau des Costières in Nîmes.

The geographical area is defined on the basis of a well-defined geological unit separated, in the north and west, from the Nîmes garrigue by the Vistre valley. It is an elevated sub-horizontal plateau that is situated at an altitude ranging between 20 and 147 metres and composed of hills formed by a pebble bed.

The area is made up of 28 municipalities located in the geographical area of Costières in Nîmes. The strawberries are produced, packaged and wrapped exclusively in this area.

The municipalities in question are:

Aubord, Beaucaire, Beauvoisin, Bellegarde, Bernis, Bezouce, Bouillargues, Le Cailar, Caissargues, Comps, Garons, Générac, Jonquières-saint-Vincent, Ledenon, Manduel, Marguerittes, Meynes, Milhaud, Montfrin, Nîmes, Redessan, Rodilhan, Saint-Gervasy, Saint-Gilles, Sernhac, Uchaud, Vauvert and Vestric-et-Candiac.

5. Link with the geographical area:

5.1. Specificity of the geographical area:

5.1.1. Soil and climate factors

The production area of ‘Fraises de Nîmes’ belongs to a geological and geographical territory that is located between Meynes, Vauvert, Saint-Gilles and Beaucaire to the south-east of Nîmes and to the north of Camargue, at the junction of Occitanie and Provence, and called ‘Plateau des Costières’. It is a well-defined geological unit separated, in the north and west, from the Nîmes garrigue by the Vistre valley. Its natural frontiers are the Gardon valley in the north-east and the low-lying plain of the Petit Rhône in the east. Its southern slope features rolling hills that end in the marshes of Petite Camargue.

This plateau is home to ancient alluvial deposits, represented mainly by vast stretches of a gravel-sand mixture and of pebbles from the plio-quaternary (Villafranchian), brought by the Rhône and the Durance between Avignon and Montpellier. A large part of this Villafranchian gravel is made up of pebbles, to a depth of 5 to 10 metres, in a clayey-sandy-loamy to sandy-loamy-clayey soil matrix, the colour of which varies from light yellow to dark red and from which the softest calcareous elements have disappeared. At night, these pebbles release the heat of the sun stored during the day.

This type of warm and well-drained soil is beneficial to strawberry growing (limited rooting, slightly calcareous soils with an acidic tendency) and promotes the early maturity of the fruit.

The climate of the area is characterised by three main features: the wind, the rainfall patterns and the substantial periods of sunshine. The substantial periods of sunshine are a factor in the early maturity of the fruit (more than 2 500 hours of sunshine a year, or more than 250 days). The rainfall patterns mean that there is no need for irrigation in the autumn and the winter, when the covers are open, because rainfall is heavy then and the water is well-drained owing to the pebbles in the soil. In the spring, there are intense but short periods of rain and the ambient humidity decreases rapidly owing to the wind: thus the wind contributes to keeping the crop healthy, as the producers can open the tunnels when humidity is high and, conversely, close them in times of fog.

5.1.2. Human factors

The cultivation of strawberries in the Gard and in the PGI area has traditionally been marginal and small-scale.

At the beginning of the 1960s, in the PGI area, ‘the strawberry started being considered one of the crops capable of adapting to the region following the water management of agricultural land’. The suitability of the area was soon demonstrated by the amounts and early maturity of the strawberries. The production areas at the time were the Plateau des Costières, with the early variety ‘Surprise des Halles’, and the Cévennes, with ‘Madame Moutot’, which is not a very early variety. Strawberry production in the Gard was at its height at the end of the 1970s, with 70 ha being cultivated by 145 farmers.

Tunnels covered by plastic sheets are used systematically on the land. These tunnels protect the strawberries from the strong and destructive mistral wind, which damages the leaves and fruits of the strawberries, and contribute to early production.

The producers have been able to master the production of strawberries under cover, irrigation and nitrogen fertilisation in order to produce high-quality strawberries picked when mature. They know that the correct way to package this delicate fruit is to put it into punnets at the edge of the field.

It rapidly became clear that in the PGI area strawberries mature approximately 15 days earlier than in the Carpentras basin. The gustatory qualities of this strawberry are recognised by many professionals (wholesalers, retailers, etc.), and the marketing chain is short for this high-end product sold on the Côte d’Azur and in Paris, Strasbourg and other places. The present reputation of the strawberry was established recently by local restaurateurs such as the POURCEL brothers from the ‘Jardin des sens’ in Montpellier and by chefs Philippe FAURE-BRACE from Bistrots des Sommeliers in Paris and Pierre INFANTE from the Confrérie des Restaurateurs de Métier of the Gard. A biannual public event was also launched: ‘la Fraise de Nîmes fait son cinéma’. The objective of this event is to invite Nîmes residents to taste this spring fruit in a few selected places in the town such as cinemas, restaurants, bakeries, the tourist information bureau, etc.

5.2. Specificity of the product:

The specificity of the product is based on the early maturing of ‘Fraises de Nîmes’.

‘Fraises de Nîmes’ are the only strawberries grown in the open in France and available on the market from the beginning of March until the end of May at the latest, when the first stone fruit appear.

This characteristic is directly linked to the soils (in particular the presence of pebbles) but also to the climate and to the fact that the strawberries are produced under cover.

The producers of ‘Fraises de Nîmes’ have developed a technique for early production, owing to which the strawberry is the first fruit of the year to be grown in the open:

The fruit is grown partly under cover, as the tunnels need to be closed starting on 15 February. Prior to this date, it is necessary to guarantee a total number of hours of cold sufficient for the buds to break dormancy (700-900 hours). The tunnels are closed after 15 February in order to promote the vegetal recovery of the plant and ensure its early maturity. Once the covers have been closed, it is necessary to take the climate conditions into account in order to, for example, open the tunnels partially for a few hours to get rid of any excessive humidity that might cause cryptogamic diseases in the strawberry plants.

5.3. Causal link between the geographical area and the quality or characteristics of the product (for PDO) or a specific quality, the reputation or other characteristic of the product (for PGI):

Early maturity, an essential characteristic of the product, is possible owing to the climate and to the method of cultivation developed by the producers.

Strawberries started being grown in the PGI area thanks to the favourable climate and soil conditions. The cultivation of strawberries became established because it fits particularly well into the schedule of the producers, who are above all fruit growers.

Early fruit is obtained through a combination of soil and climate factors, varietal factors and special know-how:

— the varieties used (the ‘Gariguette’ and the ‘Ciflorette’ are early-maturing varieties),

— the natural surroundings where they are grown (at least 20 % of the soil consists of pebbles), which warm up rapidly and release at night the warmth of the sun stored during the day, plenty of sunshine and winter temperatures cold enough for the buds to break dormancy,

— the cultivation practices of the farmers (growing under cover to promote an early start-up owing to the thermal efficiency gain and to protect the strawberries from drying winds and cold that make the leaves, in particular, fall), growing in the open in order to benefit from the qualities of the soil (well-drained, heating aided by the pebbles).

The production method of ‘Fraises de Nîmes’, which are grown in the open and harvested under cover, makes it possible to obtain a clean and bright fruit whose minimum sugar content is 7,5 % Brix.

The history of the strawberry in the Gard shows that strawberries have always been grown on this land. Today, the PGI area alone accounts for more than 50 % of the cultivated area under strawberry in the Gard. It is a crop in perfect harmony with its surroundings and, owing to its growing schedule, it complements well the selection of crops produced in this agricultural area by strawberry producers, who often also grow other fruit.

Reference to publication of the specification:

(Article 5(7) of Regulation (EC) No 510/2006)

https://www.inao.gouv.fr/fichier/CDCIGPFraisesDeNimesV2.pdf

(1) OJ L 93, 31.3.2006, p. 12.