GENEVA, March 29\u00a0\u2014 Switzerland\u2019s top court ruled Friday that plant-based drinks may not use the word \u201cmilk\u201d in their marketing, rejecting an appeal from French dairy giant Danone.<\/p>\n
In a decision that echoed a similar ruling in Britain last month, Switzerland\u2019s Federal Court said it had dismissed an appeal from Danone and determined that \u201cthe designation \u2018milk\u2019 cannot be used for vegan products\u201d.<\/p>\n
The popularity of meat and dairy alternatives has surged in recent years, but the use of traditional terms like \u201cmilk\u201d for plant-based products has been strongly contested by the agricultural sector.<\/p>\n
The Swiss case centred on an oat drink sold under Danone\u2019s Alpro brand in Switzerland, with packaging reading \u201cShhh… this is not milk\u201d, with the \u201cI\u201d replaced by a white droplet.<\/p>\n
In 2022, the Zurich Cantonal Laboratory banned the oat-based beverage from the market, saying that it violated the provisions of the Swiss law on foodstuffs.<\/p>\n
The lab\u2019s decision was upheld by the Zurich Cantonal Court, and Danone Switzerland then appealed to the Federal Court.<\/p>\n
In a statement detailing Friday\u2019s ruling, which brought four years of proceedings to a close, Switzerland\u2019s highest court pointed to a 2025 legal precedent regarding the designation of \u201cvegan\u201d food products.<\/p>\n
Based on that precedent, it said, \u201cin this concrete case, the designation \u2018milk\u2019 cannot be used for a vegan product\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn principal, the same applies if the specific term \u2018milk\u2019 is used in a negative statement,\u201d it said, \u201cor if it is modified typographically\u201d, as in this case.<\/p>\n
According to the Switzerland\u2019s Foodstuffs Act, the presentation and labelling of foodstuffs must not mislead the consumer, particularly with regard to the production, composition, and nature of the product in question. \u2014 AFP<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"GENEVA, March 29\u00a0\u2014 Switzerland\u2019s top court ruled Friday that plant-based drinks may not use the word \u201cmilk\u201d in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":40722,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[23685,586,23684,65,41,17,23686],"class_list":{"0":"post-40721","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-switzerland","8":"tag-alpro","9":"tag-danone","10":"tag-federal-court","11":"tag-geneva","12":"tag-swiss","13":"tag-switzerland","14":"tag-zurich-cantonal-laboratory"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ch\/116310312549486340","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40721","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40721"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40721\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/40722"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40721"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40721"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40721"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}