Integrating Results-Based Environmental Payments into the EU Quality Framework
By Pablo Palencia
Pablo Palencia is a veterinarian and consultant with over 25 years of experience in One Health and agrifood strategy. He served as the Regional Minister for Rural Development, Livestock, Fisheries, and Food in Cantabria, Spain. Throughout his career, he has led the development of strategic projects for cooperatives and the establishment of PGI (Protected Geographical Indication) frameworks, focusing on integrating living heritage and ecosystem services into legal structures to ensure the resilience of livestock production systems. info@iberap.com
European Geographical Indications (GIs), including Protected Geographical Indications (PGIs), were originally designed to protect product names, prevent imitation and reinforce rural value creation. Today, however, they sit at the intersection of trade policy, sustainability, public health and territorial resilience.
GIs are no longer only internal EU tools. They are already embedded in international trade diplomacy. They are explicitly negotiated in the EU–Mercosur agreement and EU–India trade discussions. This international recognition makes them not only cultural assets, but strategic economic instruments. Enhancing their environmental and health dimension would therefore be comparatively straightforward: the legal recognition and trade architecture already exist.
The question is not whether the GI framework should be preserved. It is whether it can evolve into a structural instrument of One Health and differentiated territorial economics.
The legal foundation is solid. Regulation (EU) No 1151/2012 established the quality schemes for agricultural products and foodstuffs, defining the link between product characteristics and geographical origin. The 2024 reform of the EU quality policy framework has strengthened protection, improved enforcement mechanisms and enhanced the role of producer groups, particularly in sustainability commitments. However, even with the reform, environmental performance remains largely optional. The regulatory system protects origin, name and production method, but does not systematically integrate measurable soil health, antimicrobial stewardship or biodiversity criteria.
This gap matters. If terroir is the foundation of differentiated quality, then soil biological function should logically form part of the quality definition. Soil health directly affects animal resilience, nutrient density, water retention and carbon sequestration. It influences antimicrobial use, farm profitability and ecosystem stability. Yet soil remains absent from structural GI requirements.
At present, the EU regulatory framework for PDOs and PGIs does not condition eco-scheme payments or other CAP environmental support on the adoption of sustainability practices; in other words, environmental commitments remain voluntary and are not linked to financial incentives. This gap limits the systemic impact of sustainability measures and represents an opportunity to create a performance-based connection between GI compliance and CAP support.
The strategic question for the European Union is how to revitalise PDO and PGI schemes as forward-looking territorial instruments in a context of soil degradation, biodiversity loss and antimicrobial resistance. Although Regulation (EU) 2024/1143 encourages sustainability commitments, their voluntary character has limited systemic impact. Strengthening GIs does not necessarily require reopening the Regulation.
Rather, the Union could progressively integrate a One Health performance dimension within existing structures. One avenue would involve reinforcing environmental expectations through secondary legislation or coordinated guidance at EU level. Another, potentially more immediately actionable, would consist in aligning GI specifications with CAP ecoschemes and results-based payments linked to measurable outcomes, particularly improvements in soil health and microbiome functionality as the first biological layer of food system resilience.
In this model, sustainability would remain a voluntary commitment within the GI framework; however, enhanced public support would be conditional upon demonstrable environmental performance. Such an approach would convert GIs from primarily promotional quality labels into structured territorial governance instruments capable of delivering soil resilience, biodiversity protection and public health co-benefits without adding bureaucratic complexity, and instead simplifying and streamlining existing administrative processes.
Despite this weakness, GIs are uniquely positioned to become operational One Health tools. They already link product, territory and community. They operate through collective governance. They possess traceability systems and inspection mechanisms. They are embedded in a harmonised EU legal framework recognised in international agreements. No new instrument would need to be invented.
My perspective is not only institutional or analytical. Nearly two decades ago, through Fundación Botín’s “Patrimonio y Territorio” programme, I worked directly with livestock farmers in the Picos de Europa (Nansa Valley) to develop the Carne de Cantabria PGI. By promoting cooperative organisation and pasture-based systems, we strengthened rural income, territorial identity, and population retention. This experience showed that Geographical Indications, when rooted in grazing, soil stewardship, and collective governance, already embody the logic of One Health. My proposal therefore draws on both policy vision and practical field experience.
However, structural limitations persist. Market penetration remains modest. Only 14% of European consumers recognize the PGI seal (Eurobarometer 504). This reflects insufficient mainstream communication, uneven promotion strategies and limited consumer awareness of the environmental and territorial value embedded in these labels. Enforcement is also uneven across Member States. Inspection systems focus predominantly on origin and procedural compliance, rather than on ecosystem performance or health outcomes. Environmental sustainability is permitted but not structurally required.
At the same time, producers face growing regulatory and environmental pressure without always receiving proportional economic support. Transitioning towards enhanced soil monitoring, biosecurity systems, digital traceability or antimicrobial reduction strategies requires investment. Without economic alignment, sustainability obligations risk becoming burdens rather than value multipliers.
Here lies a major policy opportunity. The Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) already provides the architecture for results-based payments through eco-schemes and agri-environment-climate measures. These instruments can reward measurable outcomes such as improved soil organic matter, reduced antimicrobial use, enhanced biodiversity indicators or carbon sequestration. GIs, with their defined territorial scope and collective governance bodies, are ideal vehicles for delivering such results-based payments.
Crucially, this integration would not require a larger CAP budget, but a more performance-oriented allocation. By linking GI compliance to measurable environmental and health outcomes, payments would further evolve from income support toward results-based public goods delivery, strengthening the legitimacy, efficiency and strategic value of EU agricultural expenditure.
While the proposal focuses on GIs as efficient platforms for implementing results-based payments, it is not intended to exclude producers outside these schemes. The approach is scalable: the same principles of measurable environmental and health outcomes could extend to other producers or collective organisations, ensuring fairness, broad participation, and alignment with CAP objectives.
Comparatively, other jurisdictions provide instructive examples. In the United States, geographical labelling systems such as American Viticultural Areas (AVAs) protect origin but remain largely detached from environmental conditionality. In Japan, the GI system has incorporated elements of regional branding linked to cultural identity and premium markets, yet without structural integration of soil health metrics. Some Latin American designations, particularly in coffee and cocoa sectors, increasingly combine origin certification with sustainability standards driven by private schemes. However, these models often rely on voluntary private certification rather than integration within a public agricultural policy framework.
The European Union possesses a comparative advantage: it combines a legally binding GI regime, a powerful agricultural policy and a growing One Health agenda. No other jurisdiction integrates these components at comparable scale. The missing element is policy coherence.
Strengthening GIs as One Health instruments would also reinforce their international trade dimension. Since GIs are explicitly recognised in agreements with Mercosur and are central in negotiations with India, enhancing their sustainability content would increase their strategic value abroad. It would allow the EU to export not only protected names, but verified environmental and health standards. This would strengthen the global positioning of European differentiated agriculture.
Communication is equally crucial. If only a minority of consumers recognise or actively purchase GI products, the sustainability premium remains under-leveraged. A coordinated EU communication strategy should highlight the link between GI products and soil health, antimicrobial reduction, biodiversity and territorial resilience. Consumers increasingly respond to health and environmental narratives. GIs can embody these values, but only if the message is clear, credible and measurable.
A reformed approach would therefore require three aligned actions: integrating measurable soil and health criteria within GI specifications, linking compliance to results-based CAP payments, and reinforcing EU-level communication strategies to expand consumer reach beyond niche segments.
Such an evolution would not dismantle the current system. It would deepen it. It would transform GIs from quality labels into structured territorial governance mechanisms. Farmers would no longer appear merely as recipients of production support, but as custodians of biological capital embedded in a legally recognised framework.
Europe already has the instrument. It is internationally protected, legally consolidated and politically legitimate. By aligning it with One Health principles and CAP result-based incentives, the EU could convert Geographical Indications into operational platforms for rural resilience, differentiated economic growth and environmental performance.
The opportunity is institutional, economic and strategic. What remains is the decision to connect the pieces that are already on the table.
This post was written by Pablo Palencia.
Photo credit: GI logos downloaded from the Commission Geographical Indications web page.