Brussels, 30/05/2006 (Agence Europe) - At a round table organised in Alsace, France, on 23 May on the future of the wine industry, the French organisation of wine and wine-based spirits producers, CNAOC, and the Italian 'Confederazione nazionale dei consorzi volontari per la tutela delle denominazione di origine (FEDERDOC) expressed huge concern about the initial approach suggested by the European Commission to reform of the EU wine market (see EUROPE 9195 on the suggested reforms). The two organisations say that before publishing its report on 21 June 2006, the European Commission should carefully analyse the impact of its proposals on the European wine-making industry, which has been greatly weakened by the current economic situation.
According to Christian Paly, President of CNAOC, the EU wine market will not be brought back up to strength by announcing as the main measure uprooting 400,000 hectares of vineyards and EU vineyards must not become a variable for adjusting to the global market. We need a dynamic vision, he said, rather than turning in on ourselves. Reform has to be ambitious, he said, to make EU wine competitive and win over consumers, particularly in developing markets. CNAOC believes the programme the European Commission wants to introduce would lay the EU wine market bare by devoting most of the funding available to uprooting vineyards and transferring a large proportion of the money to rural development programmes, which would challenge the specific sector-based approach to the benefit of a common agricultural 'pot' and treat national farm industries unfairly by forcing each Member State to co-fund measures.
The wine-makers are also concerned about the European Commission's desire to deregulate the industry. The proposal to totally liberalise table wines labelling and allow EU wines to be mixed with wines from outside the EU, and to allow unfermented grape juice imported from outside the EU to be turned into wine in the EU fundamentally jeopardises the policy of having high quality, 'authentic' EU wines, they claim. FEDERDOC President Riccardo Ricci Curbastro criticised this approach for risking not only to make consumers even more confused and unable to distinguish between different wines, but also to undermine the efforts of wine-makers in specific geographic areas to produce higher quality wines.
In a letter to EU Agriculture Commissioner Mariann Fischer Boel, the Committee of Professional Agricultural Organisations in the EU, COPA, and the General Confederation of Agriculture Cooperaives in the EU, COGECA, also expressed concern about the European Commission's intentions for its future communication on reforming the wine market. Information recently leaked in the media, they write, 'suggests that the Commissioner wishes to make a clean sweep of the past, which could bring an end to the specific nature of the age-old wine growing tradition in Europe.' They ask 'the Commissioner to clarify the situation so as to avoid any misunderstanding that the publication of these articles in the press could create within the European wine sector.'
The European Council of Young Farmers (ECYF) is calling for a fundamental change to the aid system for wine-making in the EU, saying that the distillation fund should be revised and the savings made in this connection should be used to boost competitiveness, introduce the harvesting of unripe grapes, increasing the use of unfermented grape juice in wine-making and improving the reputation of EU wines among consumers. The ECYF believes the system of permanently uprooting vineyards should be kept but considerably slimmed down and temporary uprooting should also be promoted. Young farmers want the EU to overhaul its marketing strategy for EU wines to greatly improve the reputation of EU wines on the EU and global market.