Despite all this record, Galician lacon has become no longer a product exclusively ellaborated in our Autonomous Community, being currently also produced in several other places of the Spanish land. There exists, moreover, a tried and tested fact in the society and the market as of current: The strength of top-quality products.
From the sum of both factors, and in acknowledgement of its origin, its traditional nature, its unique features - regarding shape, elaboration and presentation, as well as its analytic, organoleptic and culinary conditions - a concern grows in the Galician pork sector and in the Autonomous Administration itself, being materialized in 1997 with the creation of the Regulating Board of the “Galician Lacon” Guarantee of Quality, or Specific Denomination, and in the passing of its regulations by the -back then- Department of Agriculture, Cattle and Mountain of the Galician Government (Xunta de Galicia) (ratified by the MAPA in July 1998).
The main targets to be pursued by the aforesaid Board will be: the defense of the denomination, the application of its regulations, the promotion and quality control of the sheltered product, as well as the development of all kind of proportionate and informative actions to make for a wider awareness about it.
In order to meet the above, and in support of the established in our regulations, we have introduced since 1999 the European Norm EN 45011 on “general requirements relating to bodies dealing with the certification of products”. This has led to the development of a manual and a whole set of written procedures which comprises our policy of quality and the commitments to which the Regulating Board is bound.
By all the above, having met all legal requirements demanded by the European Union, the Official Journal of the European Communities of May 7, 2001 published the Regulation 898/1 on the acknowledge of “Galician Lacon” as “Protected Geographic Indication”, which meant not only the awarding of the higher prize to a quality product, but also a great responsibility in the keeping of the identifying standards of our product, all for the benefit to the consumers.
