EU Island Farming and the Labelling of its Products

Farming in the islands of the European Union faces specific challenges due to isolation and small size, which justify specific policy tools in terms of structural and regional polices. The question whether the output of island farming (island agricultural and food products) is of such a specific quality that labelling it as such by ways of an optional quality term in the sense of Regulation (EC) No 1151/2012 is justified or not. Capturing the socio-economic reality of island farming in the EU as well as the labelling strategies pursued by stakeholders on the market demonstrates that a specific labelling rule for island products has benefits in particular for small producers and/or small islands, but that it would better be accompanied by the labelling of the specific name of the island(s) concerned.