In the face of a new plan to reduce the glut in the European wine market, the EU is about to embark on a new round of subsidies to encourage farmers to uproot vineyards. Once again they're missing the mark.
There's agolden rule nobody wants to pay too much attention to: if you produce too many grapes on your vines, you're going to make at best, forgettable wines. A vine can only concentrate so much flavour into its fruit: spread that amongst 5 kilos of grapes and you can make wine with no obvious defects, but not much going for it. Make enough of it and sell it cheap enough and in the UK market you've probably got a winner. But what happens if you concentrate that same flavour into just one kilo
of grapes.
Unfortunately for wine legislation the world over, no region is prepared to bite the bullet and limit per acre production to a level that would do any good. Only a few small producers have got the message. Often they're in areas that you've never heard of, or thought just made plonk.
I've spent most of the last ten years seeking these small producers out. The wines usually cost a little more, but that's hardly surprising since they're probably only producing a fifth of the grapes their mass market competitors are. With wine, just like anything else, you get what you pay for.
I published this in the Guernsey Press on 1st July 2006.