The Economic Impact Of Geographical Indications For Agricultural Products

Geographical indications are place names (in some countries also words associated with a place) used to identify the origin and quality, reputation or other characteristics of products. GIs are a kind of intellectual property. The special quality of geographical indications means corresponding economic benefits. Therefore, most countries in the world have used geographical indications to protect their special products. Since agricultural products generally have stemmed from its origin and the special quality often affected by the local geographical factors, such as climate and soil, the protection of geographical indications for agricultural products is more important.France is the first country that set up a special law to protect geographical indications in the world. Most of protected objects in France are agricultural products and food.In recent years, as Chinese economic development and integration into the world economy, more and more agricultural products have been protected by geographical indications, and have achieved good economic and social benefits. Many well-known geographical indications products have appeared, such as Shaanxi apple, Shaoxing rice wine, Longjing tea, etc.However, there are many problems exist in registering and using of geographical indications. The function and economic benefits of geographical indications have not been fully understood.Judging from the current domestic research, the study of the geographical indications is mostly confined to the legal perspective, such as intellectual property. There is little study on geographical indications from economic perspective, and the majorities remain on the level of descriptive analysis, there is nobody who has studies this question by systematic empirical analysis.Therefore, this study summarized and drew on the relevant research results, then studied on the protection of geographical indications issues using economic theories: Firstly, we do economic analysis for the protection of geographical indications, and use economic theory to explain it; Secondly, after introducing the descriptions of development of geographical indications in China, we use Shaanxi Apple geographical indications as a study case, make a detailed study of the application process of geographical indications and its active roles, analyze the impacts of registering Geographical Indications of Shaanxi apple to prices, exports and incomes of peasants; Thirdly, based on the economic theory and case study, make a panel data model and analyze the relations between the protection of geographical indications, price and cost-benefit ratio.The conclusion of this article shows that the registration of geographical indications could significantly increase the price and cost-benefit ratio of apples. geographical indications has a notable positive effect to the price of apples, registering geographical indications has increased the price of apple byï¿¥13.46 per 50kg; The cost-benefit ratio of apple has been significantly affected by registering geographical indications when other conditions unchanged, registering geographical indications has made the cost-benefit ratio -of apple increased 20.78%.According to the theoretical analysis and empirical conclusions, some viable policy recommendations for the protection of geographical indications are provided: States should strengthen the protection of geographical indications; strengthen the supervision and management of geographical indications; local governments should play a leading role in registering for geographical indications.This study makes a quantitative analysis of the economic impact of geographical indications for the first time, presents a complete analysis framework of the economic performance of geographical indications.