The Directive 2004/113/EC implementing the principle of equal treatment between men and women in the access to and supply of goods and services” (hereafter referred as “the Directive”) marked an important step in the development of EU gender equality laws when it entered in force on the 21 December 2004.

While it was preparing this report, bearing the above context in mind, the Committee on Women’s Rights and Gender Equality held a hearing in Brussels on 28 January 2010 on gender equality strategy, attended by a number of specialists and EU women’s organisations; the participants pointed to the need for further breakthroughs to enable gender equality to be translated into reality and women’s rights to be defended and promoted as fundamental human rights.

– improving the flexibility of the labelling policy, in taking into account the WTO policies, by: 1) removing the distinction between the rules on labelling wines with and without GIs, most importantly facilitating the indication of vine variety and vintage on wines without GI status, in order to allow EU wine producers to market “new world” type wines (i.e. single vine variety), and thereby put EU wine producers on an equal footing with external competitors, 2) maintaining and improving the traditional terms system, 3) adapting the policy on trademarks, 4) amending the language rules in the wine sector to allow more flexibility on the u ...[+++]se of languages, 5) ensuring health and consumer information and protection, 6) fully informing the consumer of the origin of the product through appropriate labelling rules on traceability and 7) allowing to inform consumers on the environmental aspects of production practices.

8. Welcomes the adoption of the new Civil Code in 2002 and the implementation of laws concerning equal treatment of women and men, but deeply deplores elements of the planned new penal code, such as the proposals for sentences for honour killings and rape, which is at odds with European human rights' standards; calls on Turkey to implement a specialised body for the promotion of equal treatment as demanded in Article 11 and 12 of the Racial Equality Directive and Articles 13 and 14 of the Employment Equality Directive;

5. Is disappointed that the Member States have not properly followed up the Council recommendations on gender equality and that the decisions taken at the Lisbon and Barcelona European Councils concerning better participation by women in employment and concerning the quality and quantity of child care have not been followed up with adequate policies at European and national level;

6. Notes with concern that no progress has been made in relation to the preceding programming period with regard to the establishment of monitoring indicators; emphasises that the introduction and systematic use of gender-specific qualitative and quantitative indicators are crucial to the monitoring and evaluation of programmes with an eye to assessing the effectiveness of Structural Funds measures in terms of the equal opportunities objective, and particularly with a view to the 2003 mid-term evaluation, the potential revision of the measures and the allocation of the performance reserve;