A Study On The Growth Of Geographical Indication Brands

In China, the striking significance of combining brand with agriculture enables branded agriculture to be the objective requirements for adapting to the new age of agriculture and rural economy development and enhancing the overall quality of agriculture and rural economy. Nevertheless, the business circle and the academic circle concentrate more on the construction of regional agriculture brands with a view to the immaturity of developing brands of farm products and agriculture industry owing to rural small-scale industry in China nowadays. In this respect, in light of prominent characteristics of provenance, exploring and utilizing geographical indication resources are of great significance to the development of regional branded agriculture. The major problem, however, lies in the following:the issues on "geographical indication" are mainly restricted to the legal protection of copyrights, while in reality, geographical indications as a proof of provenance have been evolved into immense intangible assets, which embodies remarkable distinctive differences, whereas insufficient exploration has been carried out to the reality of possessing the essential attributes of brands. Thus, although all regions are involved in the declaration and protection of geographical indications, a molded and mature theory is needed to further excavate the market value of geographical indications and to construct geographical indication brands so as to enhance the practice of developing distinctive regional agriculture, which is still at an exploring and accumulating stage. Therefore, exploring the market value of geographical indications from the perspective of brands and analyzing the growing pattern of the value of geographical indication brands then become a research or a project with great theories and practical significance. And the distinction and variety of the accomplishment of geographical indication brands in Fujian tea products present a precious sample for this dissertation.In this study, "the growth of geographical indication brands" is a biological metaphor of the construction and market promotion of geographical indication brands in regional agricultural development. Consequently, based on the life process, the focus of the study urges the present dissertation to abide by the following principles:First of all, according to the mainstream point of current brand construction--"A successful brand relationship is equal to a successful brand (Duncan,2000)", a perspective based on "brand relationship" is chosen, and the pattern of geographical indication brand relationship is constructed so as to provide a guidance and theoretical support for the marketing and the value growth of geographical indication brands. The detail can be found in Chapter Two.Secondly, the growth of geographical indication brands in Fujian tea industry is targeted as a research subject focusing on brand relationship management, development orbit, development mechanism and utility conduction during the growth of geographical indication brands, and the growing discipline of geographical indication brands is therefore thoroughly analyzed. In this part ——based on the practice of Fujian tea industry, chapters Three and Four respectively probe into the management of the relationship between two levels of geographical indication brand growth of Fujian tea products:one is the relationship between geographical indication brand growth of Fujian tea products and the tea industry, and raises proposals for the evolved industry cooperation management of geographical indication brand growth of Fujian tea products; the other is the relationship between geographical indication brand growth of Fujian tea products and interest-related parties, and provides the foundation of major behaviors for geographical indication brand growth via systematic questionnaires and game analyses. Chapter Five, by combining the practice of geographical indication brand growth, illustrates in depth the life process, features, development mechanism and utility conduction of geographical indication brand growth, thus thoroughly mastering the systematic movement trail and discipline of geographical indication brand relationship. Then, based on the consideration about the fact that systematic movement of geographical indication brand relationship is more a self-fulfillment process.Finally, by means of analyzing and summarizing the comparison among typical cases of rapid growth of geographical indication brands in Fujian tea products, this dissertation extracts the keys to motivating the growth of geographical indication brands to provide beneficial strategies and suggestions for the development of distinctive regional tea industry in Fujian and for the development of other distinctive regional agriculture as well. The detail can be found in Chapter Six.In addition, Chapter Seven is the conclusion and evaluation part of the whole dissertation, pointing the prospect of future study, and raising general proposals for promoting geographical indication brand growth and distinctive regional industry development on the basis of the survey on geographical indication brand growth in Fujian tea industry.The probable original and innovative results of the present research include: first of all, based on biological metaphor, a systematic research on realizing the market value of geographical indications is carried out from the perspective of regional brands in the height of overall life view. Secondly, by employing brand relationship theory in combination with the source of value of geographical indication brand growth, the study initially outlines the pattern of geographical indication brand relationship and indicates that the growth of geographical indication brand should involve handling two levels of relationship:one is the relationship between geographical indication brands and industry development, and the other is the relationship between geographical indication brand and interest-related parties. This is a significant development for the theory of brand value and that of brand relationship, which is of certain originality. Thirdly, the project combines theoretical analysis with case study; a theoretical system--including the feasibility and necessity of branded geographical indication, the connotation and restriction of branded geographical indication and its growth, the movement trail and movement mechanism and utility conduction of geographical indication brand growth, and the driving pattern of geographical indication as well---is relatively systematically proposed for the first time. Fourthly, the study innovatively proposes that brand positioning is actually the key to motivating the positive growth of geographical indication brand, based on which it further puts forward countermeasures and suggestions of making clear and deepening agricultural development, thus enhancing the construction of regional geographical indication brands in other industries, and promoting distinctive traditional regional industries.