WHAT’S IT ALL ABOUT?
The European Union definition of ORGANIC WINE is ‘wine made from organically grown grapes.’
Outside the EU,organic wine may be defined as ‘wine made from organically grown grapes’ or ‘organic wine’.
Organic farming is a form of agriculture which avoids or largely excludes the use of synthetic fertilizers and pesticides, plant growth regulators, and livestock feed additives. As far as possible, organic farmers rely on natural practices to maintain soil productivity, to supply plant nutrients, and to control weeds, insects and other pests.
Organic grapes generally come from two sources,land that has been returned to an organic state over a period of time or virgin land that has never been treated in the first place.
Producers of BIODYNAMIC WINE adhere to biodynamic agricultural principles.
These are complex but, in brief, they entail consideration of planetary
influences as well as the ecosystem.
Biodynamic producers aim to achieve a perfect balance in terms of consideration of wildlife, crops and the environment (celestial as well as terrestrial) with minimal or no intervention.
The FAIRTRADE Mark is an independent consumer label which appears on products as an independent guarantee that disadvantaged producers in the developing world are getting a better deal. They receive a minimum price that covers the cost of sustainable production and an extra premium that isinvested in social or economic development projects.The interesting thing here is that these projects are 
based either in the poorest of cooperatives which can have a reduced ability to produce quality wine, due to the lack of modern wine making equipment or you have the modern cooperatives producing both fair trade and "ordinary" wines presumably paying more for the fair trade grapes...which seems very strange!
Nice summary - I'm very skeptical about the Fairtrade mark in particular, the other day my housemate came home with a Fairhills Cab-Petit Verdot from Tesco, having proudly dropped just a fiver on it. It was muck but more importantly I wonder how Tesco can sell it for that price with any sort of reasonable contribution to the producer.
ReplyDeleteAs for biodynamics - don't get me started. It's more at home at Hogwarts with Professor Sprout alongside her Mandrakes and Venomous Tentaculas.
Fair trade wines tend to be at least one to two euro a bottle dearer at the point of retail.Iwonder how much of this premium actually finds its way to the grape grower
ReplyDeleteEvelyn