Global wine shortage?

WINE TALK
1

Just saw this article that describes a “global wine shortage”, as it seems that global demand is about to outstrip supply…I understand that China has in the recent past been increasing their purchases of trophy wines like First Growth Bordeaux, creating somewhat of a squeeze, but I would have never thought that in the overall market wine would be in short supply…The local big-box wine shops here in NJ (Gary’s; Wine Library, etc…) certainly seem to be well stocked… [basic-smile.gif]

2

I can’t tell from the charts how much of this may reflect short crops in 2010-12 in a number of regions.

Is the EU still paying to distill surplus wine?

3

Yeah. I just remember reading last year or so about millions of excess acres of vines in Europe and Australia that governments were paying people to rip up. Also, China now has more vineyard space than the USA? WTF?

4

Let them drink yellow tail.

5

Wine shortage? If you got the money, I got the wine.

6

There is definitely a shortage of Premier Cru Bordeaux at the 20 euro price point!

7

And that is probably just for starters. Given the land mass and geography there is probably tons of wonderful terroir yet to be explored and cultivated. Wouldn’t put it past them to be the worlds biggest producers (and consumers?) in a few decades.

And if you think of the billion or so people in China, India, South America and Africa moving into middle classdom there is probably a market for that wine in the future too.

8

No worries, I am doing my best to be a global wine shortage prepper.

When hitsfan happens, I wanna be ready!

9

+1

10

This was discussed in the documentary “Red Obsession”. The shortage isn’t a 2013-2014 issue, but rather when the estimated millions of Chinese who are new to wine start purchasing. They further state that once this happens, there won’t be enough wine made in the world to supply just the Chinese market.

Disclaimer: just passing on what I saw on Red Obsession; I have no idea go when that day will come…if it ever does. I’m only hoping they love sweet white wines.

11

Expecting any trend to continue is one of the most common mistakes of the modern era.
I say “modern” because in past centuries events moved slowly enough that supply/demand imbalances could last a long time.

If someone is forecasting a shortage, someone else is already readying additional supply, often setting the stage for future oversupply.
As recently as this year supplies were being destroyed is mass quantities.

P Hickner

12

hmmm…

Wine lake

The wine lake refers to the continuing supply surplus of wine (supply glut) produced in the European Union. A major contributor to that glut is the Languedoc-Roussillon, which produces over one-third of the grapes grown in France. In 2007 it was reported that for the previous several vintages, European countries had been producing 1.7 billion more bottles of wine than they sell.[1] Hundreds of millions of bottles of wine are turned into industrial alcohol every year, a practice that is sometimes described as “emergency distillation”.[2]

Remedies
Another attempted remedy is Plan Bordeaux: an initiative introduced in 2005 by ONIVINS, the French vintners association, designed to reduce France’s wine glut and improve sales. Part of the plan is to uproot 17,000 hectares of the 124,000 hectares of vineyards in Bordeaux.