Hot weather brings on early harvests across Europe
Summer heatwaves brought harvest dates forward for key wine regions across northern Europe, with many reporting increased production estimates for 2018.
France’s total production will reach 44.5m hl, according to the head of FNSEA national farmers’ union, Jérôme Despey. If correct, the figure will mark a 20% rise on the historically low 2017 total, bringing national wine production back in line with the average for recent years prior to that.
Despey’s forecast, made on 24 August, was more conservative than initial estimates made by France’s Ministry of Agriculture, which predicted levels of 46m-48m hl. Being a winemaker in Languedoc-Roussillon himself, Despey added that climate change had brought forward harvest dates by 30 days in the last 30 years.
Prolonged warm summer weather ushered in early harvests across France, despite earlier setbacks caused by hailstorms, heavy rainfall and mildew. Champagne’s harvest began on 21 August, some two weeks earlier than usual, while in Alsace the wine-growers’ association set a later date of 3 September as the start of harvesting for the region’s still appellation wines.
Across the border, Germany reported a record-breaking early harvest, brought on largely by consecutive weeks of warm and sunny weather in June and July, the first grapes for Federweisser being picked in Rheinhessen on 6 August, following the country’s warmest April since figures were first collated. The Deutsches Weininstitut said there was optimism over potential quality, although some growers needed to irrigate younger vines and vineyards on shallow soils, in particular.
Meanwhile in northern Italy, the first grapes for Italian sparkling wines were picked at the end of August. A warm summer and a cooling-off period just before harvest, with some rain, has given DOC Prosecco near-ideal growing conditions, according to its council’s president Stefano Zanette. Following a largely warm, dry summer, ‘ the rain and the lower temperatures were exactly what we had been hoping for’, he said.
Italy’s 2018 wine harvest was expected to rise by between 10%-20% compared to 2017 – one of the lowest harvests since 1945, according to the country’s farming union Coldiretti.