From the editor

By all accounts the 2009 vintage has been a success with total volumes settling at much the same as last year but with the diluted wines that emerged from the later pickings in the 2008 vintage being a thing of the past. Producers pressured growers to reduce crops so that quality remained high although new plantings coming on stream meant that the overall tonnage was much as before. So far so good.

But there are still disturbingly prevalent accounts of huge stockpiles of wine throughout the country that have yet to find a home and it is perhaps alarming that my local supermarket has dump stacks of Sauvignon Blanc from 2007 on special at less than $8!

While this may provide some good pickings for present day consumers, in the long term our wine industry runs the danger of shooting itself in the foot once more. It is dangerous to rely on the strategies of the major producers as a mechanism for controlling the overall quality of wine that is exported under the New Zealand banner. Although we may not wish to go down the path of the pedantic French appellation controls we do need some way of protecting our brand.

Marlborough has to be our main concern for not only were a large number of the diluted 2008 wines marketed, legally, under the Marlborough banner but for many overseas consumers and distributors Marlborough IS New Zealand wine!

While it seems unlikely that industry regulations will solve the problem, there are commercial, market driven solutions that might do the trick.

How about establishing a Marlborough ‘qualmark' with enough investment in international marketing to make it truly meaningful? Maximum cropping levels could be established for any wine carrying the mark with some allowances made for exceptional sites or exceptional vintages. Growers and producers who wished to crop at higher levels would be denied the ‘clout' that the branding provided and would have to decide whether to drop fruit or go it alone.

Sure it would involve a bit of bureaucracy and rules are generally an anathema to the Kiwi psyche but maybe it's something we have to put up with if we want to retain the international reputation of our wines. Many hundreds of Australian growers who have been forced to abandon their vineyards in the wake of their Australian brand being sold down would see it as a no brainer.

Good sipping

Martin Gillion

Winetrack profile NZ success stories

The readers competition offers the chance to win a case of wine.