DAN'S WINE BLOG- SOME GLOBAL NEWS

This week a couple of interesting things happening that are/will have an impact on global wine. Firstly:

PIWI VARIETIES

Whilst Australian winemakers in general have significantly less of an issue and cost with vineyard disease then their European counterpart's, in Europe it is a big issue as more and more local governments press to limit the number of sprays that vintners can use. As a result of this, several years ago the Germans started experimenting on creating vines that were much more disease resistant- powdery mildew, downy mildew etc. In typical fashion the outcome has a unpronounceable Germanic name that just about every consonant in the alphabet in it, so they abbreviated it to PIWI. I have written about Piwi’s before, especially in relation to France where they are being severely restricted, so this in effect is an update. Apart from the health related issues, the other benefit of Piwi varieties is that fungal infestation is one of the biggest challenge to Europe’s growing organic viticulture and Piwi’s ensure a significant reduction in sprays required, to the extent that it is estimated that spraying costs could be reduced by around 80%, also leading to a significant reduction in CO2 generation. In these environmental/global warming conscious days they might be of some help in keeping the wine industry viable in many European countries. Piwi vines already represent around 3.5% of Germany’s vineyard area- and growing quite quickly.As www.Magazine.wein.plus reports at Germany’s ProWein in March 2024 there will be a focus on Piwi wines in the “Zukunftsweine.de ” initiative. They say that “Piwi’s will be one of the most important trends at the trade fair” as many wineries in Europe have started experimenting with some of these varieties. They are expecting about 60 producers to showcase their Piwi wines. In typical European style, most countries are creating their own Piwi varieties with “ non-confusing and easy to remember names” such as Italy’s Riesling Resistente & Souvigner Gris or Austria’s Blutenmuskateller, Donauriesling or Donauveltliner.

DOWN, DOWN

According to the OIV (Organisation of Vine & Wine) this year’s grape harvest, across the world, is the lowest we have had in 60 years. Their current estimates are that it will be down around 7% on last year, which was already down on the average for the previous few years. Almost all southern hemisphere wine producing countries have reported lower volumes due to inclement weather, especially Australia, South Africa and Chile. In the northern hemisphere vintage has only recently finished and not all regions have reported their final figures, however indications are that volumes will be around 5% lower than the rolling five-year average. Of the “Big three” producers, Spain is expected to end up down by about 11-12% with Italy down by around 12-13%, whereas in comparison France expects to end up near or on their average production volume. Whilst the vast majority of the reduction is due to weather events, a small portion of the reduction is also due to the commencement of vineyard removal schemes in several countries as the world grapples with oversupply and diminishing wine consumption. To put the oversupply into context, Italy has a surplus roughly the equivalent of a whole vintage- around 4.3 billion litres of wine. A great time to start a winery!!!It will be interesting to see what Vintage 2024 brings, will the surplus grow again or will it continue to decrease? With Bordeaux just starting to grub out 9-10% of its vineyards, only time will tell.

Well that’s it for another week, have a great one, stay safe, always #chooseaustralianwine and when you can enjoy #emergingvarieties.

CheersDan T