By Nicolas Petros Kaparti
Producers and supermarkets[/B] are sitting on the coals after the Legal Service's opinion on violations of the PDO specifications for halloumi. As highlighted in a report by the Cyprus Times two months ago, the market is flooded with halloumi that do not meet the requirements set out in the relevant legislation.
The opinion of the Legal Service clarifies anew that for a product to bear the name halloumi, the quota of sheep and goat's milk in the mixture must be more than 51%. The President of the Republic is now called upon to find a solution to the whole issue at his meeting next Monday with the Cheese Makers' Association, as producers will now have to comply with the specifications.
In a statement to the Cyprus Times, General Secretary of the Cyprus Retail Trade Association, Marios Antoniou, said, "We are the last link in the chain and we have no information from any relevant ministry. We are waiting for Monday's meeting to make the final decisions so that we too know what we will put on our shelves from next week regarding halloumi."
In fact, Mr. Antoniou believes that in order not to create further problems in the market, stocks should be registered and given room to be sold.
"If these quantities are withdrawn - considering that there are no large quantities of PDO haloumi on the market - you realise that we will not have haloumi to sell for some time. These are very small quantities of cheese dairies producing haloumi with PDO specifications. The vast majority of what is on the market is off-spec halloumi," Antoniou noted.
He added that "the second given is whether off-spec PDO halloumi will continue to be on the market, but under a separate name, and the third given has to do with where the price will shoot up if we go to PDO halloumi."
Asked to explain why the price will be higher when PDO specifications are placed on the market, Mr Antoniou explained that: "the price will be much more expensive because the specification file requires some specific instructions. Goat's and sheep's milk is more expensive and there are many different issues in the dossier that have to be respected. What people need to know is that if we go to PDO specification halloumi, then we are talking about a much more expensive price."
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