The Lebanese Industrialists’ Association (LIA) cooked up a storm in October when its president, Fadi Abboud, told various press agencies that Israel was causing offence by producing and selling hummus which, he argued, is a Lebanese product. Talal Abu-Ghazaleh, chairman and founder of Jordan-based IP group Talal Abu-Ghazaleh Organization (TAGorg), agreed. “If it is made using Lebanese ingredients and a Lebanese recipe it should be sold as Lebanese hummus not Israeli hummus,” he told WTR. “I’m not claiming or assuming that Lebanon has ownership of the production itself, rather that it has rights in the geographic name.” 

The LIA has threatened to launch a legal campaign to prevent further hummus production in Israel, underscoring a wider debate about the lack of geographical indication (GI) protection across a region fraught with border disputes, potentially leading to a multi-sided battle over which country can actually lay claim to a product like hummus. Abboud has argued publicly that because Lebanon’s culture is thousands of years old, it thus can be said to have the strongest grasp on the dish. The LIA drew its battle lines with Israel, presumably because it could easily argue that, by definition, 60-year-old Israel has no claim to an ancient recipe. But Lebanon’s borders are also only 60 years old. Many observers argue that a pan-Levant claim to hummus developed before Western intervention in Middle East borders. Egypt and Syria, for example, have as much historical claim to hummus as Lebanon. 

Even if Lebanon’s cultural claim stands up, it may fall down before it makes it to court, as the country has no laws to protect GIs. “There is a lack of experience in Arab countries as to the importance of GIs and their economic, social and cultural value,” admits Mohammad Khriesat, IP consultant and member of the GI committee at the Arab Society for Intellectual Property (ASIP). Hoda Barakat, managing partner and head of the IP department at Dubai-based Al Tamimi & Company, notes that although many Arab states do not have specific GI laws, GIs are often protected as certification marks under trademark legislation. “The United Arab Emirates hasn’t yet protected GIs but indeed has provisions representing basic forms of GI protection. Both the Trademarks Law and the Suppression of Fraud and Cheating Law include articles that prohibit registration and penalize use of marks that constitute a false GI,” says Barakat. “The legislation could be amended for broader protection or a separate enactment may be introduced in the future to protect GIs fully.” Egypt and Morocco have protected GIs rigorously through existing trademark legislation. Further, “Jordan, Bahrain and Oman have all signed bilateral trade agreements with the United States,” observes Barakat, “which require GI protection.” A number of other Arab countries, such as Algeria, have special GI laws (Algeria, a member of the Lisbon Agreement since 1972, had registered 846 GIs as of 2005), and several others have GI laws that have not yet been activated (these countries include Jordan, Oman and Qatar). Such disparate levels of protection are exacerbated by the number of Arab countries that provide limited or no protection. 

Abu-Ghazaleh is working to change that by harmonizing and then strengthening the current systems. Through TAGorg, he has campaigned for more robust IP rights across the Arab world and was one of the founders of the ASIP in 1987. Now Abu-Ghazaleh is focusing on GIs and has recently founded the Arab Society for Geographical Indications (ASGI), which will seek to bolster GI protection under the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights.

“The original idea came at an annual meeting of the ASIP in Abu Dhabi two years ago,” he says. “There was a feeling among governments and leaders of the business community and civil society that we needed to do something to improve the situation for GIs.  ASIP was thus entrusted with the responsibility of setting down proposals and solutions for their protection in the Arab world.” But the diversity of legal systems across the region means solutions could be hard to find. As Khriesat says, “the Arab countries have different regulations and different priorities… ASGI will work alongside governments, private sector bodies and professionals in the field of GIs in order to build cooperation and protect the assets of Arab countries”.

As the ASGI looks closer at building cooperation and setting legislative agendas, Abu-Ghazaleh expects to learn from the European Union. “We need guidance in drafting a common agreement for Arab countries,” he states. “And we need the European Union’s expertise in setting up the methodology for GI protection. We’re looking towards the European Union for technical advice, not for any legal agreement for mutual protection at this stage.” Barakat agrees that “there is a lot to be gained from talking to the European Union”. Lebanon, meanwhile, has already received some assistance from Europe. In 2004 its Ministry of Economy and Trade entered into an agreement with Switzerland, which committed funds to help the Arab country set up a GI project with the aim of defining an adequate system for the protection of GIs. Dina Fahs, the project’s legal expert, says: “Firstly we gathered an inventory of about 100 products and then identified 40 that had the greatest reputation. From this we analyzed the types of the products, the methods of production, the delimitation of the region of production, exportation, importation, human factors and natural factors existing in the region.” The Swiss collaboration came to an end in January 2008, when the ministry continued the work alone. Fahs has worked with her government to draft a GI law for Lebanon. “Now we are preparing the decree for the application of the law,” she says, which will be finalized once the GI law is approved by the Lebanese Parliament.

The GI project team research found that many producers from a number of regions are interested in protecting GIs and it is now working with several GI owners to prepare their products for protection as soon as the law is enacted. Lebanon’s could be a good model for the fledgling ASGI to follow. “I hope that the ASIP, and its relationships with the League of Arab States, the IP offices in Arab countries, the World Intellectual Property Organization, the World Trade Organization and the European Union, can help us succeed in our project to protect GIs.”

For more information about the ASGI, look out for a forthcoming feature in a future edition of WTR Magazine.

Adam Smith, World Trademark Review, London