Pork chops can be labelled as “Made in Slovenia” even when the label on the back side of the package says that the animal was reared in Austria, slaughtered in Austria and butchered in Austria. If the packaging was done in Slovenia, the produce can be labelled as “Made in Slovenia”.

Slovenian consumers prefer Slovenian products to foreign ones. Big retail chains were quick to notice the trend and capitalise on it.

“The product you’re talking about is manufactured by Celjske mesnine, a Slovenian company. The final production stage, i.e. boning, labelling and distribution, is done in Slovenia,” head of Lidl Slovenia’s PR department Tina Cipot said, adding: “Hence, the law says that the product can be labelled as ‘Made in Slovenia’.”

“This isn’t our trade mark. It’s the retailer’s trade mark, so the retailer decides what the label says,” Celjske mesnine head Izidor Krivec said.

Slovenian laws on food labelling were passed at EU level. The law says that if a product undergoes the final production stage in Slovenia, it can be labelled as “Made in Slovenia” – even if the manufacturer just adds a few spices.

Country of origin food labels are a different story. Those labels have to specify where the source animal was born, reared, slaughtered and boned. If all those stages were done in Slovenia, the product can be labelled as a product of “Slovenian origin”.