In two days the supermarket shelves will be filled with nougats of different flavors and in this race to win over the customer, the Valencian farmers do not want the almonds from the Valencian Community to lose step. This is what they fear will occur after the rejection by the Department of Agriculture of the appeal for reconsideration filed by La Unió Llauradora regarding the modification of the specifications of the PGI Jijona and Turrón de Alicante. The specifications, in force since 1996, currently guarantee that the raw material for Alicante nougat (be it Valencia, Mallorca, Mollar, Marcona, Planeta or Largueta almond) comes from Alicante, Castellón and Valencia.
In this appeal, La Unió expresses its disagreement with the disappearance in the text subject to modification of the origin of the raw materials, mainly almonds, because “it gives free rein to nougat manufacturers, covered by the PGI, to use without any type of restrictions, almonds produced anywhere in the world.”
For its part, La Unió points out that Agriculture rejects the appeal, alleging that "the place of origin of the almonds has no relevance in obtaining the PGI Turrón de Jijona and Alicante product, much less does it affect its quality, while For La Unió this can affect quality and differentiation".
The defense of the origin of the almond also coincides with that made by La Unió of the Valencian almond producing sector, since the entity maintains that the prices they receive this campaign are "ruinous due to the lack of demand, fundamentally those of our native variety Marcona."
Increasingly lower prices and unfair competition for almonds imported from third countries - "the nougat manufacturers take advantage of a brand here to sell almonds from outside the Valencian Community," they maintain - are the two problems that they observe and for those who ask to the Generalitat Valenciana solution. "Nothing is done from official bodies or from organizations that supposedly ensure the quality of our product, but quite the opposite," they point out. This newspaper tried yesterday to find out the version of the Department of Agriculture, but without success.
The proposal to change the PGI specifications comes from the Regulatory Council, which includes Alicante nougat industries, but also public universities, packagers, consumers and the Valencian Administration itself.
The situation denounced by La Unió is in contrast to that which occurs in the PGI Torró d'Agramunt, the other protected geographical indication of nougat that exists in the State. This PGI, with specifications updated in 2022, does not specify the origin of the raw material, but it does give great importance to the production of the product.
In this case, the document prepared by the Generalitat of Catalonia and approved by the European Commission in June 2022, stipulates that to guarantee that the product is originally from the area, it must be made with hazelnut/almond, honey or egg white, but nothing specific about its origin. He insists that the production process in the workshops be done in the traditional way and will be made "exclusively" with authorized raw materials and ingredients.
