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Issue 517 - March 22nd - 26th 2021 - Expressly created for 4.185 wine lovers,
professionals and opinion leaders from all over the world |
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1600 years of history condensed in one date: March 25, 421, the symbolic day of the founding of the city of Venice, as witnessed by the manuscript source of the “Chronicon Altinate” and, in more recent times, by Marin Sanudo. Thus, the celebrations for the 1600 years ab urbe condita have begun around the world, with official events, exhibitions, museum tours and seminars. Venice, world capital of culture and symbol of the Serenissima, will be celebrated in its dimension of the city “of land and water” for a whole year, until March 25th 2022, with Prosecco Doc, which has dedicated two special editions to the 1600 years of the city, as its partner bubble. |
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At the fair, with pre-equipped “turnkey” spaces and protocols to ensure safety and business to exhibitors and visitors, exclusively insiders, from Italy and the world, thanks to the support of Ice, the Ministry of Agriculture and Foreign Affairs, and the main organizations of the industry that provide full support, such as Unione Italiana Vini (UIV) and Federvini. But also the “States General of Italian Wine”, with Italian and European institutions, entrepreneurs and top managers of the sector, to create a new and shared vision of the future of a strategic sector for Italy. All this will be “Vinitaly Special Edition”, the b2b event staged on October 17-19 at Veronafiere, after the postponement of Vinitaly no. 54 to 2022 (“Opera Wine” by “Wine Spectator”, on the other hand, remains on June 18-19, 2021, an anthological edition with the 200 iconic wineries of Italian wine in the world), due to the pandemic. An event that, in everyone's intentions, should mark the real restart of Italian wine, in a pandemic that has hit the sector hard (and in January 2021, exports to the top 10 markets were down 19% on 2020, according to Vinitaly Observatory - Wine Monitor), and that by then, hopefully, Italy and Europe will have largely overcome, as China already seems to have done and the United States is doing. Presenting the event, but also VeronaFiere’s international activities that have never stopped, today were the president and managing director of VeronaFiere, Maurizio Danese and Giovanni Mantovani, with Stefano Patuanelli, Minister of Agriculture, Food and Forestry Policies (who defined Vinitaly as “a fundamental event for the sector”, Manlio Di Stefano, Undersecretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, Federico Sboarina, mayor of Verona, Carlo Ferro, president of Ice-Agenzia, Paolo De Castro, MEP, Gino Colangelo, president of Colangelo & Partners and Alessandro Mugnano, CEO Interprocom Cantine Divine. “Vinitaly Special Edition - said Mantovani - is an event that we have strongly shared with the world of production and associations. It will be a Vinitaly that is smarter and easier for companies to manage” (all speeches in the in-depth article). |
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An in-person auction, today, is still a mirage around at least half the world. Not in Hong Kong, as told to WineNews by Raimondo Romani, at the helm, together with Flaviano Gelardini, of the “Gelardini & Romani Wine Auctions”, in view of the auction on March 28th, with bottles that are the symbol of Italian wine, represented in all its finest forms. Now, however, there is another step to be taken, because “among the great Asian public a widespread perception persists according to which Italy is still following behind France’s lead”, Raimondi said. A wrong narration, compared to which, “I try to do justice, underlining how the icon of Burgundy is called “Romaneé-Conti”, and not “Parisienne-Conti”, because it is with the Roman Empire that viticulture was able to spread in Europe”. |
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No machinery and no herbicides are used, just animals grazing in the vineyards managing and trimming the grass, to improve the healthiness of the soil. It is actually an ancient and proper, as well as not specialized, practice in agriculture, while today it is considered a “niche”. However, it is gradually becoming more and more widespread amongst Italian wineries, from North to South, “and useful for viticulturists and shepherds”, Professor Leonardo Valenti (University of Milan) tells WineNews. This practice is taking the spotlight and showing all its magnificence. The focus is mainly on sheep, as one of the small, but charming wine companies in the Berici Hills, PuntoZero has adopted, PuntoZero, led by Marcella Toffano De’ Besi (the winemaker is Celestino Gaspari, ed.), where just in these days the sheep are grazing (in the photo). But we can cite many examples, such as the Bepi Boret winery on the Cartizze hill, or the Tenuta Le Querce, in the Vulture, in Basilicata,or Cottanera sull’Etna, in Sicily. Plus, there is no shortage of different kinds of experiences, such as the “ox project” by Alois Lageder, in Alto Adige, or even the story of geese in the vineyard between rows of Sagrantino di Montefalco at the Di Filippo winery, or in the vineyards of the Sardinian Olianas winery, or even in Chianti Classico, at Casa Emma, just to name a few. |
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Nobile di Montepulciano was the first denomination to put “Toscana” on its labels, and made it obligatory as well, to distinguish itself from Montepulciano d’Abruzzo, but also to add one of the gems of the Renaissance to the group of the Tuscan Region brand, one of the most successful in the world. Now, Morellino di Scansano has followed the same path, whose producers, from now on, will not have to, but will be able to add the words “Toscana” on the labels of the Maremma appellation. |
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Between the EU proposal, postponed not passed, to put alarmist warnings in wine labels as on cigarette packs, and the traffic light label for food, there are many battles that Italy, and not only, leads in Europe. “Almost one out of four Italians (23%) would stop drinking wine or would consume less of it if on the label they would find writings like those on cigarette packages”, says Coldiretti, according to a survey conducted on its website. “The one against the Nutriscore (which categorizes as more or less healthy a food depending on the content of fats, sugars and salts, and not on the quantity of consumption) is not only a battle on labeling systems, but on the future of agriculture”, Confagricoltura insists.
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Scams and counterfeiting “pilfer” close to 1.3 billion euros a year from the regular wine market in Europe, which is 3.3% of the total. Major damage. In order to fight this phenomenon, the European Union wants to urge member countries to invest again in the analysis of isotopes, the atoms of substances found in the wines of “that” territory as opposed to another. And it has launched a public consultation on the subject. The objective is to urge the Member States to implement the European database, which is fundamental for the effectiveness of the method. |
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