China’s Wine Boom: Is Jeannie Cho Lee the New Robert Parker?

Picture: Jeannie Cho Lee, MW

Will the American Parker Story Repeat itself in China?

Many people say, China’s wine industry is now there were America was 50 years ago. In the last 50 years, we have seen a wine revolution and boom in America and a lawyer from the Washington DC region emerging as the most influential wine critic in the world, guiding the American consumers with their enormous purchasing power in the choice for buying a wine and having an enormous impact on wine making around the globe.

While being very popular and highly appreciated in the US and elsewhere, Parker is very much disliked in Europe. Many Europeans feel that European winemakers have changed the style of their wine to please Parker and to get high scores from him. Parker, in their view, was also detrimental to a diversified range of wine styles. Everyone was moving towards Parker’s taste. Because, when he gave high scores to wine, 200 million American wine consumers would by the wine.

Will the same happen again with China? Will a Chinese wine expert emerge as leader of the large and growing purchasing power of the new generation of wine consumers in China? Who will be the Chinese Robert Parker? Will there be another Parker effect?

The Parker Effect

The Parker effect – European wine producers were changing the way they had been making their wine for ages with the view of pleasing Mr. Parker and achieving high points in his ratings – had two root causes.

First, the globalization of the wine market. Bordeaux wine were not only shipped to London any more but around the world, including to America and Japan, where affluent consumers started to drink wine.

Second, these affluent consumers were new in the wine business. Before World War II, there was no wine in America – the period of Prohibition. After World War II American military personnel observed diners in other countries enjoying daily wine with their meals, and they brought this concept back to their own homes. The sale of gourmet cookbooks rose, wine tastings became popular as a new kind of social event and wine became a symbol of culture and status.

The American Wine Boom and the Unsure American Wine Drinker

In 1968, consumption of table wine finally surpassed that of dessert wines in the US. And by 1972, wine consumption was 340 million gallons, or about 8 liters per person, which was three times the figure before prohibition. A wine revolution had begun in the US.

But American wine consumers were unsure. Wine was a new thing. They had not gone through the school I had gone through in Europe – daily wine on the table and wine consumption during the lunch and dinner with my family, but were not sure what to buy, and were looking for guidance. They had not started to drink wine at home for lunch or dinner early on in their lives. They had not had a father or mother who taught them what a good and what a bad wine was. This guidance gave them Robert Parker and thus became the most influential and powerful wine drinker in the world.

This guidance could have given them somebody like the Brit Hugh Johnson. But they did not trust him. They wanted an American.

The Chinese Wine Boom and the Unsure Chinese Wine Drinker

Aren’t we in China in a similar situation?

The wine industry in China is developing at a remarkable pace. China could become the world’s largest producer of wine in 50 years time, experts predict.

China has a long tradition of producing all kinds of wine, but produced practically no vinifera wine before the economic reforms of the early 1980s. It now ranks 6th in terms of production, ahead of Australia, Germany, South Africa and Chile, almost at par with Argentina, which is in 5th place. The top four producers are France, Italy, Spain and the US.

The renowned Pauillac estate Chateau Lafite Rothschild, partnering with CITIC, China's largest state-owned investment company, is in the process of setting up a winery in China to produce grand cru wines there.

In terms of consumption, China was the eighth largest wine consumer last year, behind leader Italy, France and the United States in the top three spots. One of the main features of the China wine market, as supposed to western markets, is the predominance of red over white wine. Around 85 per cent of the wine drank in China is estimated to be red. However, as more Chinese women develop a taste for wine, white wine drinking is expected to rise relative to red wine.

At 0.4 liters per person a year, wine consumption is still quite low by international comparison. In France, where wine is culturally embedded, people drink 50 liters a year with consumption in Australia, another major wine producing nation, 25 liters and in the United States 15 liters. If China's per capital wine consumption was to only increase slightly because of the scale of the population it could easily shift the center of gravity of the world's wine industry.

Imports are small but growing. Consumers in China have very limited knowledge about wine. It is very difficult for them to assess the quality of either branded or even non-branded wine. Consumers still find the process of buying imported wine difficult because even in international supermarkets like Carrefour or Tesco there is little information on the label to tell them what the wine is.

Jeannie Cho Lee

Most likely, Chinese consumers will increasingly look for guidance when to buy wine. That guidance may be provided by somebody like the the Korean-born, Hong Kong-based Jeannie Cho Lee . She is a Master of Wine and the first Asian, among 300 wine experts around the globe, to have been awarded this prestigious title by the Institute of Masters of Wine in London. The recognition has landed Lee, currently a wine consultant to Singapore Airlines, sixth place on CNN Hong Kong's "20 People to Watch" list. Now, she's come up with a book. "Asian Palate" is the first comprehensive work to match Asian cuisine with wine. See here.

Picture: Jeannie Cho Lee's New Book

Regardless of whether it will be Jeannie Cho Lee, who will become the new Robert Parker or not, it will be an Asian, or more likely a Chinese who will provide guidance to the Chinese consumer the way Parker did for the Americans. It will not be a European or American for the same reasons as it was not a European who would guide the American consumers.

The taste of this person will play a huge role in the shaping up of the global wine market. Just as Robert Parker with his enormous purchasing power of the Chinese consumers, looking for guidance, in the back.

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A Master Sommelier became a Web 2.0 Digital Sommelier- An interview with Germany's Hendrik Thoma (Part 1)

Picture: Hendrik Thoma

I interviewed Hendrik Thoma via Skype in early April 2010. This is the first of two parts. Here is the second part.

CS: You do not need an introduction for the German readers of this Blog, but half of the readers are from the US, Canada and Latin America, and one quarter from Asia, Australia, South Africa and New Zealand. Tell them a bit about you.

HT: My name is Hendrik Thoma and I live in Hamburg, Germany. I am one of 175 Master Sommeliers in the world.

A couple of years ago, I was working as head sommelier at the top Restaurant Louis C. Jacob, a very traditional restaurant, when I decided to change course and step into the exciting world of the internet. I had always been doing some journalistic work on the side, so it was not a complete U-turn.

My main job now is being the moderator of a video wine blog, TVINO. This is done in cooperation with Germany’s largest wine retailer, Hawesko. On average, I moderate 2 wine tasting shows per week. I do other things as well, but TVINO is at the center of my activities.

In my shows I try to talk about my passion – wine - in as straightforward a manner as possible. Sometimes winemakers or other people from the wine industry are on my show as guests and sometimes I am just on my own.

I am the moderator, and link the producer with the customer. I was doing this in a restaurant as a sommelier for many years and now I am doing it in a kind of virtual restaurant.

In the US, you have Gary Vaynerchuk’s video wine shows. TVINO is different, although Gary Vaynerchuk was very inspiring to me. He’s a big guy in the scene. He paved the way and I am very grateful for that. After I visited him last year I received so many nice comments. Hey, I thought, this is the modern way to communicate with people.

It is very important for me to present myself the way I am, and I can do this with the internet. Since I started TVINO, I have heard so many people saying “That’s him? We thought he was a conservative, traditional guy”. I was never traditional, I was never a snob, and I was always trying to get people to enjoy a glass of wine. Now these people get the right picture of me and this is a great thing.

Picture: Hendrik Thoma

CS: Talking about social media, you are clearly one of the leaders of social media in the wine industry in Germany. You have your own internet show, TVINO. You are very active on Facebook. Where do you see all this is heading?

HT: Well, one thing is that Europeans are very concerned about the security and transparency of the internet. Germans in particular are big believers in security and there is some blockage from those Germans who are more wary of the internet. At the same time, a lot of people realize that this way of communication has enormous potential. But in general people are still afraid when they put information on the internet. There is a lot of hesitation and concern. The internet is used more by the younger people who are in a way natives of the internet. They know the rules and for them the internet is something very natural. You and I are immigrants.

Another factor is that Europe is just so different from the US. In Germany, people live comfortably in a social net of long term friends, acquaintances and family. In America everybody is constantly moving. It is all about networking, networking, networking. Here in Europe we have a lot of people who are happily living in the old structures and don’t really see the need to change. But they will be forced to. We, the active internet people are still a small segment, but a growing one. The elder generation has to realize this. I say: Step into the web, get active and participate.

CS: You mentioned ProWein, the German wine fair in Duesseldorf which just finished. What did you take home from there?

HT: I would like to mention a couple of important trends. There is the trend to move to fun wines, away from expensive big show-off wines. Parker has pushed the market into wines which are big-image, fruity, heavy wines, with high scores. But people really don’t want that anymore. Gone are the days when everything was great, the economy was booming and people were eager to bring 96 or 97 Parker point wines on the table.

Drinking rose wines is another trend. Imagine ten years ago: In Germany people said they would rather stay out of rose and now roses, good roses are, hot.

Another thing is sweet versus dry: I was talking to the Mosel winemaker, Markus Molitor, who produces great wines with residual sugar. People are now more comfortable with that. Wines don’t have to be as dry and acidic as German Rieslings sometimes can be. Winemakers are playing again with sweetness, with the Mosel and the Rheingau area at the fore.

All in all, I see a move to wines with more elegance and more finesse. People prefer to drink local rather than international wines. People don’t want to pray when they sit in front of a glass. They want to drink, they want to enjoy. You can pray on Sunday in church.

Social media, coming back to this, plays a big role in this because now it is no longer top to bottom information. People pretty much obeyed wine gods like Robert Parker and would check at the winery if the wines had an 88 or 89 score. Now people have direct contact with me and many other people in the web, such as you, Christian, with your Wine Blog. I think that this will create a more democratic way of drinking wine. Less academic and more passionate. That is what I want.

(The second part of the interview will be published on April 19, 2010)

Hendrik Thoma, Hamburg, Germany
www.hendrikthoma.de
www.tvino.de




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New Hampshire, USA: Cheese ….and Lobsters and Oysters … and Wine!

Picture: New England Map with New Hampshire and Christian G.E.Schiller in front of typical New England house, with dog Oscar and cat Peace.

New Hampshire, USA: Cheese ….and Lobsters and Oysters … and Wine!

New Hampshire is one of the most, if not the most Libertarian State in the US. It is on the East Coast, part of New England. I am always amazed, when I go there to visit my daughter Dorothea and her husband Christian to see the license plates on the car with the motto.

Picture: New Hampshire License Plate

Cheese

Of course, there is cheese in New Hampshire.

When you talk in Paris with a Frenchman about cheese made in the US and tell him that there are now excellent such cheeses made by very devoted and knowledgeable cheese makers, he will not believe you. But there is a rapidly expanding production of great artisanal cheeses in the US, though starting from a very low level. Cheese will probably never play the role in an American household it plays in a French household. The typical French grew up in a household where in the evening his or her mother would serve a four courses meal---crudites as starter, main plate, cheese and dessert, with a glass of wine of course, or two. The French have it in the Jeans. He or she knows so much about good food, including cheese. In the US, it is very different. Cheese is eaten as topping for Pizza or for the cheeseburger or similar food. But America is changing. Some Americans have started to show serious interest for high-quality cheese and artisanal cheese makers are springing up across the country.

And this cheese explosion is going east now to Europe. I was at the Borough’s market in London a few months ago and I was surprised finding Neal’s Yard Dairy to sell Roque River cheese from Oregon and the Pleasant Ridge cheese from Wisconsin.

Lobster

Then, there is seafood.

New Hampshire only has a small stretch of the coast and I am not sure it produces its own seafood in meaningful amounts, but seafood is readily available in Concord. I always have at least once a lobster, a New England clam chowder and Oysters.

Interestingly, in North America, lobster did not achieve popularity until the 19th century, when New Yorkers and Bostonians developed a taste for it. Prior to this time, lobster was considered a mark of poverty or as a food for servants. The lobster industry became global, once the transportation industry could deliver live lobsters to urban centers. Fresh Maine lobster became a delicacy exported all over the world, in particular to Europe and to Japan.

The European lobster is more expensive and rare than the American lobster. It has been on the menu of the royal and aristocratic families and the rich and famous, in particular of France, for many centuries.

I like my lobster simple steamed with drawn butter. As for the wine, I try to go local: Finger Lakes, Long Island or New Hampshire wine (see below) … or a dry German Riesling that is crisp, fresh and high in acidity.

Oysters

Then, I always have my Oysters.

Oysters have been a favorite of food lovers throughout the centuries. And they have always been linked with love. Casanova reportedly started an evening eating 12 dozen oysters. Oysters were cultivated long before the Christian era. The Greeks served them and the Romans were in particular enthusiastic about those from the shores of the English Channel.

I like them best au natural, or with fresh lemon juice. There are also two classic sauces to be served with raw oysters. The first is a mignonette sauce with shallots and vinegar and the second is a chili sauce.

I have not seen in Concord any oysters from New Hampshire, but occasionally, you find some from Maine, though most are from Long Island or are brought up from Virginia. In most people’s minds, Maine is a lobster country. But the same frigid ocean, terminal moraine, and unpolluted coastline that grows such delicious lobsters also makes for beautiful oysters, with the Damariscotta River estuary standing out. Maine oysters grow slowly. A Maine oyster needs three years minimum.

The best oyster wines are dry, crisp, clean-finishing white wines. I try to go local: Finger Lakes, Long Island or New Hampshire wine (see below) … or a dry German Riesling that is crisp, fresh and high in acidity.

Wine

Wine in New Hampshire? Yes, there is wine in all 50 States.

Wine is now produced in all fifty States, with California leading the way followed by Washington State, Oregon and New York State and Virginia. However, some States outside the Northwest do not grow popular vitis vinifera grapes such as cabernet sauvignon very easily, and some wineries in the smaller wine-producing States buy juice or grapes from other States.

The United States is the 4th largest wine producing country in the world after France, Italy, and Spain. North Dakota was the last to join, in 2002. Alaska’s wine is made from grapes from other states. New Hampshire is a relative new kid on the block, joining the list of states that began pioneering winemaking in the early 90's.

For reviews of wines from all 50 States go to here. http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1837245,00.html

One thing that is not well known in Europe is the struggle in America in the past centuries to find the appropriate grapes for winemaking. In the original charter of the thirteen colonies was a royal commission to pursue three luxury items that England was unable to provide for itself: wine, silk, and olive oil. Every colony made attempts to satisfy the requirements of its charter, but made only limited progress. The problem was that on the one hand there were the native American grapes. All these native American grapes were cold tolerant and disease and pest resistant, but not well suited for wine making, due to their coarseness, high tannins, and "foxy" flavors. On the other hand, the vitis vinifera which settlers brought from Europe, were well suited for wine making, but uniformly did not survive long enough to produce a crop.

Despite many years of failure, the early Americans persisted in their efforts. And they had some success. First, they planted several different native varietals in the same vineyard and over time some natural mutations occurred; the results from some of these hybrids were far better than any of the unadulterated natives. A big step forward was made in 1740 when a natural cross pollination occurred between a native American grape and a European vitis vinifera. Other successful crossings followed.

Today, European vinifera grapes dominate wine production in California, Oregon, Washington State, New York State and Virginia.

There are now twelve commercial wineries and vineyards in the State of New Hampshire. French hybrids are found to grow best in the cool New England climate, including Seyval Blanc, Vignoles, and Vidal, as well as Chardonnay and Pinot Noir.





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The Emerging Wine Giant China - Mouton Cadet Bar Opening

Picture: China - The Great Wall

The Emerging Wine Giant China - Mouton Cadet Bar Opening

It has been announced that Baron Philippe de Rothschild will open a wine bar in China. It will be the world’s first Mouton Cadet wine bar in restaurant No. 9 Garden in Guangzhou. Look for the Mouton Cadet wine bar to open in mid-March 2010.

The wine producer Baron Philippe de Rothschild SA, owner of the famous First Growth Bordeaux Chateau Mouton Rothschild and its distinguished lieutenants, Château Clerc Milon and Château d'Armailhac as well as the premium wine Mouton Cadet is arguably one of the big players in the global wine market. Baron Philippe de Rothschild was one of the first to invest in California and created Opus One with Robert Mondavi in 1979 and he was one of the first to go to Chile, where he entered a partnership with Concha y Toro in 1997.

Picture: Robert Mondavi and Baron Philippe de Rothschild, New York Times

Now, Baron Philippe de Rothschild SA is opening its first wine bar in the world in China. This is clearly another sign that China is becoming a major player in the international wine market, both in terms of production and exports and in terms of consumption and imports.

Production

The wine industry in China is developing at a remarkable pace. China could become the world’s largest producer of wine in 50 years time, experts predict.

China has a long tradition of producing all kinds of wine, but produced practically no vinifera wine before the economic reforms of the early 1980s. It now ranks 7th in terms of production, ahead of Germany, South Africa and Chile and almost at par with Australia and Argentina, and it is likely to overtake Australia soon. China already produces more wine than Spain and Portugal combined.

Much of the wine industry is run by the Chinese Government. The wine industry is dominated by three giants. Great Wall, Changyu and Dynasty Estates are the big players of China’s burgeoning wine industry.

The wine production area largely rests in the Yantai region. Located roughly 300 miles southeast of Beijing, the peninsula is part of Shandong province. Its proximity to the Bohai Sea and the Yellow Sea gives it a maritime climate, shielding it from the cold winters of northeastern China, not very different from Bordeaux in France. With some 10,000 hectares of vineyards, the area is home to many well-established wine companies producing Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Cabernet Franc.

Picture: China with Yantai Peninsula in Shandong

China’s first winery, the Changyu winery, was established in 1892. It won gold medals in the 1915 World Expo for their Roses and Rieslings. Its cellar is the largest wine cellar in Asia. Changyu puts out a million and a half bottles of wine annually. Dynasty Estates is a joint venture of the state and the French company Remy Cointreau.

The renowned Pauillac estate Chateau Lafite Rothschild, partnering with CITIC, China's largest state-owned investment company, is in the process of setting up a winery in China to produce grand cru wines there. The French wine maker plans to plant on 60 acres in the Shandong province. Chateau Lafite has an extraordinary reputation in China - so much so that the property's second wine, Carruades de Lafite, commands the same price as other first growths such as Haut Brion.

Like Mouton Rothschild, Lafite Rothschild also has a track record of pioneering ventures around the world. As well as its Bordeaux properties it has prestigious estates in the Languedoc - Chateau d'Aussieres, Vina Los Vascos in Chile and Bodegas Caro in Argentina.

Apart from the large wineries, the Chinese wine industry is also littered with smaller, privately owned wineries. Many people say it’s like being in Napa 35 years ago; there’s a buzz, the industry is still in its infancy but you know it is bound for greatness.

Consumption

China already ranks behind Germany on fifth place in terms of wine consumption. Given current trends, China will soon overtake Germany.

One of the main features of the China wine market, as supposed to western markets, is the predominance of red over white wine. Around 85 per cent of the wine drank in China is estimated to be red. However, as more Chinese women develop a taste for wine, white wine drinking is expected to rise relative to red wine.

There are two market segments.

First, the lower end mass wine market. Growth in demand in this market segment --- the easy drinking, low quality cheap wine --- is expected to be high. At 0.4 liters per person a year, wine consumption is still quite low by international comparison. In France, where wine is culturally embedded, people drink 50 liters a year with consumption in Australia, another major wine producing nation, 25 liters and in the United States 15 liters. If China's per capital wine consumption was to only increase slightly because of the scale of the population it could easily shift the center of gravity of the world's wine industry.

Second, the other market segment, where China will be increasingly present is the top wines. Since 2000, expensive red wines, in particular from France, have become very popular in China among the rich and the famous. Red wine, in particular French red wine, has become a symbol of the elite and the rich. Within a decade or so, China’s rich have gone from mixing red wine with Coke to checking Parker points when ordering a wine and being ready to pay top dollars. They have become a major player in the top market segment.

The fact that expensive, red wine are more a status symbol and that they are often not consumed privately at home with friends but in public with business partners or given as present, has led to an increased price differentiation of wines depending on the condition of the label in the international market. Bottles with labels that do not meet the highest aspirations and cannot be used as a present for a business partner are suffering a steep discount at auctions or are not sold at all.

Exports

Most of the wine is produced for the local market. China still has a low profile outside of Asia, but many are watching to see if this industry becomes a global player. Experts predict that China could become the next Chile within a decade – a destination for affordable and quality wine production.

Imports

Imports are small but growing. Clearly, Baron Phillip de Rothschild SA with its Mouton Cadet is well placed to participate in this boom. Young Chinese consumers are also now showing a preference for foreign imported wines, although they still make up only 11 percent of the wine drunk by volume in China.

A lot of quite low-tier foreign wines sell at a high price in China. Consumers in China have very limited knowledge about wine. It is very difficult for them to assess the quality of either branded or even non-branded wine. Consumers still find the process of buying imported wine difficult because even in international supermarkets like Carrefour or Tesco there is little information on the label to tell them what the wine is.

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Nyetimber's Classic Cuvee 2003 from England was Crowned Champion of Sparkling Wines in the World

It caught me pretty much with surprise, when I read that Nyetimber's Classic Cuvee 2003 had been crowned champion of worldwide sparkling wines in the 2nd annual "Bollicine Del Mondo" competition in Verona, Italy, impressing judges more than sparklers from French legends such as Bollinger, Pommery and Louis Roederer. In all, 52 wines were tasted blind by a panel of oenologists, winemakers, sommeliers and journalists at the competition which is run by Italy's wine magazine Euposia.

This is clearly part of the changes that are going on in the global wine market. New wine countries are emerging. They are emerging for two reasons. Some of them are benefiting from climate change as the northern border for wine growing is pushing up. Others are emerging countries and with the general economic expansion, the demand for wine and the production of wine is also going up. England is a prime example of an emerging wine country because of climate change. Many eastern European countries are emerging wine countries. Hungary, for example, has a long tradition of wine making and at some point in its history it was among the top wine producers of the world. But it lost contact to Western Europe as a result of the iron curtain and fell back, but is now clearly reemerging as major wine producer. Slovenia has reentered the international market quickly after the collapse of Yugoslavia in the mid-1990s and is producing now outstanding wines. Croatia is a bit behind, but has excellent potential. Serbia still has a long way to go. Poland has never been a major wine producer, but may benefit from climate change.

The UK now ranks a lowly 63rd on the list of the world’s wine-producing countries, but Nyetimber confirmed what many experts have been saying for some time: UK sparkling wines can compete internationally.

What is Nyetimber? For all the innate Englishness of the Nyetimber Manor Estate, Nyetimber as a commercial vineyard has always enjoyed international influence. A couple from Chicago, Stuart and Sandy Moss had the unusual ambition to find a location outside France where it would be possible to produce sparkling wine to rival champagne. They established Nyetimber Manor Estate in 1986 and - amid much industry skepticism - began the vineyard planting in 1988, using the three classic champagne varieties, Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Pinot Meunier. In 2001 the Mosses decided to retire back to the States and sold the Nyetimber Estate to the songwriter and record producer Andy Hill as a rural retreat. Nyetimber’s present owner, Eric Heerema, bought the Nyetimber Estate in March 2006. It is now the largest vineyard estate in the UK at 350 acres under vine.

Picture: Nyetimber Vineyards

Nyetimber brought English (sparkling) wine on to the world map. Will other countries follow? Russia used to produce famous sparklers, but the industry has suffered badly from many decades of communism.

Germany is one of the largest sparkling wine markets in the world, but not among the stars, although outstanding sparkling wines are increasingly produced in Germany. One out of four bottles of sparkling wine is consumed in Germany, roughly 500 million bottles. Sekt is made in all German wine regions, both in the méthode traditionnelle and charmat method. Increasingly, there are a number of top quality winemakers, who, in addition to their still wines, have started to include Sekts in their portfolio. These Sekts are typically vintage Sekts, from a specified vineyard, made of specific grapes, often Riesling, in the méthode champenoise and with little or no dosage (brut or extra brut).

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Trends in the Global Wine World - Old World, New World, Emerging Wine Countries

Picture: Trends in World GDP Shares, from Greg Mankiw's Blog

Within the past 40 years, the shares of the three main regions --- EU, USA and Asia/Oceania --- have converged to around 27 percent, with the US going steady, the EU falling by roughly 10 percentage points and the Asia/Oceania region increasing by this amount. If you do a trend projection, than you end up, say in 40 years, with something like on the left-hand axe, with the only difference that the top line at above 35% is Asia/Oceania and the line in the middle at 15% is Europe. There is a dramatic shift in purchasing power going on and will continue to go on, with implications for the wine market.

This is in broad terms the economic set up for the global village in which people consume and produce wine. Often, one distinguishes two groups of wine countries, Old World wine countries and New World Wine countries, but I think one should add a third category, Emerging Wine countries.

Old World wine countries comprise continental western Europe, with France, Italy, Portugal, Germany being the main countries. They are considered to be very much terroir driven although one is wondering what this means in the days of global warming. The President of the French wine makers recently predicted that if the climate change continues at the current pace, in 2050 the Bourgogne region will no longer be able to make its famous Pinot Noirs. The Old World will be terribly hit by global warming.

New World wine countries are the US, Latin America, Australia and New Zealand and South Africa. Not all of them are new comers. Latin America has been producing wine, and large amounts, for centuries. But it was all done for the local market. Sure, when the Spanish came, they wanted to continue to drink wine, but wine was not exported in a meaningful way and was not present in the world market. While most of the wine production in Latin America is based on Old World varieties, the wine growing regions of Latin America often have "adopted" grapes that are particularly closely identified with them, such as Argentina's Malbec and Chile's Carmenere (both from France).


Picture: Christian G.E.Schiller

Other countries, like Australia and the US are real newcomers. Here, the terroir concept is on the back burner and the grapes are at the center of winemaking. Also, these are all countries with warm weather and New World wines tend to be juicy, high in alcohol and fruity. Old world consumers tend to feel that there is too much hanky panky going on in the wine cellars of New World wine makers, but many of them have never seen a wine cellar in the new World with their own eyes but still continue to assume this.

Until the latter half of the 20th century, US wine was generally looked upon as inferior to European product; it was not until the surprising American showing at the 1976 Paris Wine Tasting that New World wine began to gain respect in the global market.

As for Australia and New Zealand, their wine product was not well known outside their small export markets. Australia exported largely to the United Kingdom, New Zealand kept most of its wine internally. South Africa was closed off to much of the world market because of apartheid, although in the 18th Century the largest exporter of wine to Europe was the Cape Province of what is today South Africa.

There is another set of countries that has started to appear in the international wine market or may do so in due course. These are the emerging wine countries. They are emerging for two reasons. Some of them are benefiting from climate change as the northern border for wine growing is pushing up. Others are emerging countries and with the general economic expansion, the demand for wine and the production of wine is also going up.

England is a prime example of an emerging wine country because of climate change. Many eastern European countries are emerging wine countries. Hungary has a long tradition of wine making and at some point in its history it was among the top wine producers of the world. But it lost contact to Western Europe as a result of the iron curtain and fell back, but is now clearly reemerging as major wine producer. Slovenia has reentered the international market quickly after the collapse of Yugoslavia in the mid-1990s and is producing now outstanding wines. Croatia is a bit behind, but has excellent potential. Serbia still has a long way to go. Poland has never been a major wine producer, but may benefit from climate change.

Another major emerging market is China, with a wine boom going on since 2000. China has emerged as the fifth biggest wine producer, mainly for domestic consumption, although Chinese wine has reportedly started to appear on the shelves of the West Coast of the US. On the demand side, the Chinese rich and famous have developed a taste for top French wines and are driving up the prices for them so that Lafite Rothschild for example has decided to set up a winery in China. China is projected to become the largest wine producing country by the middle of the century. On the other hand, China, where traces of wild wine dating from the second and first millennium BC have been found is clearly on the fast track and projected to become the world largest wine producer in some years.

Some of the New World and emerging wine countries are in fact very old. Archaeological evidence suggests that the earliest wine production came from sites in Georgia and Iran, dating from 6000 to 5000 BC. Georgia is one of the emerging wine countries following the collapse communism. Greece is another example with a long history, but only now emerging on the global wine market. Indeed, much of modern wine culture derives from the practices of the ancient Greeks. We all know, Dionysus, the Greek god of revelry and wine. Greek wine was widely known in ancient times and exported throughout the Mediterranean basin. The Greeks introduced the vitis vinifera vine to their numerous colonies in Italy, France and Spain.


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Emerging wine country: China's wine boom since 2000

New World wine country: New Zealand - facing the fate of neighboring Australia?

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Wine market: Update --- Argentinean wine removed from the shelves because of an antibiotic in the wine

I have reported earlier that Wine Control Authorities in Germany have impounded Argentinean wine and removed the wine from the shelves, because the wine contains the antibiotic Natamycin. This posting provides an update based on information provided for in the German press.

The Landesuntersuchungsamt (LUA) in the state of Rheinland-Pfalz has tested 29 wines from Germany, 41 wines from EU countries and 146 wines from non-EU countries so far. They found Natamycin in the following 5 wines from Argentinea:

Villa Paola, 2008, San Rafael (Losnummer: LOT N° 01/2009), Villa Atuel, 2008, San Rafael, Syrah Merlot (L-WT1377), Legend of Polo, 2007, Mendoza, Malbec (L 76605) und Terra Nova, 2008, Mendoza, Malbec (L: 90.0789)

Schiller Wine --- Related Posting:

Wine market: Argentinean wine removed from the shelves because of an antibiotic in the wine