Plant-based seafood company Revo Foods has revealed that a lawsuit regarding the labelling of its vegan salmon product has been dismissed.

Headquartered in Vienna, Austria, Revo faced legal action taken by the Vienna City Council. The allegation was that the food-tech start-up’s smoked salmon could “mislead” consumers with its name, despite being labelled as vegan on the packaging.

The salmon alternative is made from pea protein and states “Vegan” and “100% plant-based with pea protein” on front-of-pack.

While many similar cases have emerged in other product categories, such as oat milk – a recent example being Oatly’s four-year legal battle to use the word ‘milk’ in a slogan, after Dairy UK claimed it violated European Court regulations – fish alternatives have remained largely unchallenged so far.

Several European countries including Italy and Poland have put forward the introduction of restrictions around using meat-related terms, such as ‘sausage,’ for the marketing of plant-based food within the last year.

Many businesses in the plant-based space are challenging regulations and calling for them to be adapted, arguing that vegan alternative products are behind held back from competing in a fair market.

Robin Simsa, CEO of Revo Foods said that in the company’s view, a “clear one-sidedness or distortion of competition” is recognisable. The start-up argues that while product labelling of plant-based foods is strictly regulated, the rules for other categories appear less so – for example, ‘hamburgers’ do not contain ham and ‘hot dogs’ do not contain dog meat.

He commented: “Meat and fish farms are heavily subsidised by the public sector, for example through lower tax rates or by agricultural subsidies. However, meat is by far the biggest climate driver in food production”.

“Our packaging declares that only 100% plant-based ingredients are used and clearly labels the products as vegan without animal-based ingredients. In our view, any accusation of deception is unjustified. Many consumers are specifically looking for these types of products, and it is important to give guidance of the product taste with descriptive names.”

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