French producers of the famed blackcurrant liqueur known as creme de cassis de Dijon announced a legal victory Monday that will prevent a Chinese firm from selling any Dijon-labelled bottles.

"We are thrilled," Claire Briottet, president of the Dijon creme de cassis alliance in Burgundy, told AFP.

The sweet cordial is a cocktail mainstay for bartenders worldwide, most famously for adding to champagne for a kir royale.

The four historic producers in Dijon, including Briottet, secured a Protected Geographical Indication (PGI) label in 2013, requiring at least 200 grammes of berries per litre that must be macerated in the Dijon region.

But the alliance was warned in July 2019 by France's National Institute of Origin and Quality (INAO), guardian of the country's strict food and wine appellations, that a rival was seeking a "Dijon" trademark application in China.

"They would have been able to put "Creme de Cassis Dijon" on a bottle of water with just sugar and flavourings, and flood the market," Briottet said.

While Chinese buyers take only a handful of the 8.5 million bottles produced each year, of which around a fourth are sold outside France, the liqueur is prized in neighbouring Japan, the biggest export market.

With the INAO, the alliance appealed to the China National Intellectual Property Administration, which in December acknowledged that the rival trademark could generate confusion among consumers, and declared it "null and void".

Briottet called it a symbolic victory that would protect "the name of our territory as an international brand" for a product created in 1841.

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