However, once a TSG has been recognised, it must necessarily be produced in a manner that complies with the relevant specification, which prevents the production method from being varied, on pain of being banned from labelling the product as a TSG. In short, there would be a sort of short-circuit: only those who produced the food protected as TSG, but did not label it as such, would be able to influence the tradition at the basis of the relative specification, so as to make it possible for the latter to be modified at the request of the relative “group of producers”, i.e. those who have always respected to the letter the production methods sanctioned by the traditional practice incorporated in the specification itself. In light of this, tradition – axiom or dogma on the presence of quality? – is likely to become something granitic, at the defence of which is the legal regulation on TSGs: there is therefore no room here for imaginative innovation in the culinary art, which is the very foundation of our rich gastronomic culture. This could perhaps further explain the coldness shown to date by economic operators towards TSGs, together with the circumstance that their production is totally unrelated to the place where the gastronomic tradition developed, even though the relevant geographical reference is sometimes used in the name of the food thus protected (this is in fact the case for no less than three of the four cited Italian specialities currently registered). This marks another significant difference with respect to PDOs and PGIs, whose specifications are often subject to amendments, even concerning the most salient aspects of their production, such as the identification of the production area or the processing methods, elements that can affect their organoleptic qualities. From this point of view, then, the discipline on PDOs and PGIs is probably the only one capable of leaving room for innovation171, which constitutes one of the components of the human factor that distinguishes the reference territory of individual geographical indications. On the other hand, as their specifications are modified by enlarging the boundaries of the production area (to respond to market success or to cope with the now unfortunately unavoidable climate crisis), the influence of factors linked to the geographical and morphological conformation of the territory on the quality of the product that comes from there tends to weaken172. 171 Aa.Vv, Innovation in agri-food law between technology and comparison, 2019. 172 A. Zappalaglio, The transformation of EU geographical indications law: the present, past and future of the origin link, 2021. 357 FOODSTUFF TRADITION PROTECTION
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