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Issue 672 - March 11th - 15th 2024 - Expressly created for 4716 wine lovers,
professionals and opinion leaders from all over the world | |
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| | | Italy’s top wine brands continue to rack up international awards. And, in the headlines, Sicily rises once again, with one of its leading realities, Planeta, elected “Wine family of the year” of the “Meininger Awards Excellence in Wine & Spirit” No. 18, one of the most prestigious awards in German wine, staged in Dusseldorf, during the days of ProWein. A recognition for the Sicilian winery led by Francesca, Alessio and Santi Planeta, which comes just a few weeks after Alessio Planeta (who is also CEO of the company) was named “Winemaker of the Year” by the famous American magazine “Wine Enthusiast”. | |
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| | The final sprint that would have flipped the sign, from negative to positive, did not come. But, for the Italian wine world, the much-feared 2023 will not end so far from 2022, hailed as the year of records for exports. Provisional Istat data, over the twelve months, analyzed by WineNews, speak of 7.77 billion euros compared to 7.87 billion in 2022, a “only” 0.8% slowdown for Italian wine exports. Even the quantity figure does not deviate that much, they went, in fact, from 2.16 billion liters in 2022 to 2.14 in 2023 (-0.9%). Analyzing the individual markets, the United States in 2023 hit 1.76 billion euros in exports with a decrease of -5.3%. Germany with 1.19 billion continued its growth (+2.7%), as did the United Kingdom with 843.1 million euros (+3.9%). Off the podium is Switzerland, which, however, overtakes Canada, thanks to 419.7 million euros just below (-1.5%) the 2022 figures. Canada is, therefore, the fifth largest market by value for Italian wine exports, with 388.8 million euros with a decline of 9%, in contrast to France, which touches 316.2 million and makes a significant leap of 10.1% over 2022. Also doing well is the Netherlands (+3.8%) which surpasses 240 million euros while Belgium holds its own with 235.4 million euros (-1.6%) as does Sweden (-1.5%) which overtakes Japan thus becoming the ninth largest market for Italy by slightly exceeding 193 million euros. Japan, which stops at 183.6 million (-7.9%) and precedes Russia, which closes 2023 with 158.6 million euros (-7.7%), ahead of Denmark, which, on a percentage level does even worse (-8.5%) for 144.8 million in value, and Austria, which instead shows a growing interest in Italian wine (141 million euros, +3% on 2022). Also going down is Norway, which now stops at 103.5 million (-6.26%), and China, whose exports are at 100.1 million euros in value (-10.22%), with South Korea plummeting to the bottom (-32.5%), barely exceeding 51 million euros due to a crisis in the eastern market confirmed, albeit with a better trend, but still at a loss (close to -7.5%), by Hong Kong, a marketplace worth 25.3 million euros. The overall figure, therefore, does not appear too negative as was presaged a few months ago, but this does not mean that there is no shortage of difficulties. | |
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| | Vinitaly and Merano Wine Festival, i.e., the largest made-in-Italy wine fair and what started out as the “salon buono” of Italian wine, later to become a full-fledged trade fair event (albeit with obviously smaller numbers on the Verona kermesse) join forces with a first joint venture between the two organizations, with a very special focus: “Amphora Revolution” will be the name of the new joint project, dedicated to terracotta jars (event to be held on June 7 and 8, 2024, at the Gallerie Mercatali by Veronafiere) representing excellence at the national level with the aim of reviving an ancient technique as a revolution in support of the naturalness of the product and sustainability, as well as a challenge against climate change, as anticipated, to WineNews, by the patron of the “Merano Wine Festival”, Helmut Kocher. | |
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| | | The fine wine market continues to reset downward, which, after the first two months of 2024, sees the downward trend that has been going on for months continue, at least looking at the indices of the industry benchmark, the Liv-Ex, which sees positive signs only when looking at a 5-year horizon. The Liv-Ex 100, the main and benchmark index, is down -1.4% since the beginning of the year. An index that, moreover, sees the best Italian labels in great splendor and in counter-trend, since Masseto 2019 is the wine that has seen its listing grow the most in the first two months of the year (+10.9%), Sassicaia 2020 the third (+7.1%), and in the “top 5”, at no. 4, is Bartolo Mascarello’s Barolo 2019, at +6.8%, and, again, in the “top 10”, Giacomo Conterno’s Barolo Monfortino Riserva 2014 grows by +5.3%. The Liv-Ex 1000 does even worse (-3.5% in 2024, and -15.3% in the 12 months). Showing small signs of a turnaround are the Champagne 50 (which makes +1% in February, and -0.8% since the beginning of the year), and the Italy 100, which albeit with a modest +0.1% in February 2024, is the best index since the beginning of the year, at -0.6%, and also the one that has lost the least over the 12 months (-3.6%), as well as the second best over the 5-year period, +31.8%, behind only the Champagne 50, at +50.2% over a five-year period.
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| | | Florence, too, has its own urban vineyard, like other major cities in Italy and around the world: the new “Vigna Michelangelo”, named after the “Divine Artist” Michelangelo Buonarroti, is located on the hill overlooking the Arno River, with a view that sweeps from Brunelleschi’s dome to the hills of Fiesole, adjacent to the Iris Garden, where the germplasm of the Iris genus, the symbol of Florence, is preserved. The land is managed by the Azienda Agricola Donne Fittipaldi of Bolgheri, headed by Maria Fittipaldi Menarini. | |
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| | “Respect” for a great wine means heritage, land, identity. A value that writer Joanne Harris was inspired by in her unpublished novel “The Crown”. Here is “La Voce di Biondi-Santi” 2024, a project that consists of an audiobook and a podcast with the voices of Neri Marcorè, in Italian, and Tomas Arana, in English, accompanying the March 1 release of Biondi-Santi’s new Brunello di Montalcino vintage, 2018, along with two vintages of La Storica, the Riserva proposed by the winery at least ten years after its first release, 2010 and 1988. Sailor Giovanni Soldini is the “kindred spirit” who tells how “We cannot control nature”, with speeches by Giampiero Bertolini and Federico Radi, Biondi-Santi’s ad and technical director. | |
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| | Just over a year ago, Elena and Luca Currado Vietti left Vietti, one of Barolo’s most famous wineries. “We close one chapter and open another, it is a “consensual divorce”, but we are certainly not going to “retire” from the world of wine”, the couple had explained to WineNews. And today their word is kept, because Elena and Luca Currado Vietti, together with their children Giulia and Michele, are starting a new journey with Cascina Penna-Currado, in a historic Langa farmhouse located on a wonderful hill ridge in the municipality of Serralunga d’Alba. | |
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