Territorial Embeddedness and Registration Status of European Protected Cheeses

European Protected Designation of Origin (PDO) and Protected Geographical Indication (PGI) labels differ in the strength of the relationship that they require between a product and its territory, but comparative evidence on how this distinction is reflected in the protected cheese sector remains limited. This study provides a descriptive and exploratory comparison of the product, territorial and production characteristics associated with PDO rather than PGI status among European protected cheeses already registered under the EU geographical indication framework. A cross-sectional product-level dataset of 253 cheeses was constructed, including 192 PDO and 61 PGI products. Registration status was coded as a binary outcome, where 1 = PDO and 0 = PGI. Explanatory variables described the species, island and mountain location, production requirements, age of registration, estimated retail price, regional GDP per capita and annual production volume. Univariable logistic regression models were first fitted for each explanatory variable, followed by a multivariable logistic regression model obtained through backwards elimination. PDO products represented 75.9% of the dataset. In univariable models, all candidate explanatory variables were significantly associated with the registration status. In the final multivariable model, PDO registration was associated with the species, island location, mountain area and age of registration, while the breed requirement was retained but did not reach conventional statistical significance. Sheep and goat cheeses, island cheeses, mountain cheeses and older registrations showed higher odds of a PDO status. The results are indicative and suggest that PDO and PGI cheeses should not be treated as a homogeneous group in descriptive product-level analyses. Within this dataset, PDO cheeses appeared to be more closely associated with products showing stronger territorial embeddedness, localised production systems and a longer-established geographical indication status.