Australia Adopts EU's Geographical Indicator System For Wine 302
Posted
by
timothy
from the all-official-like dept.
from the all-official-like dept.
onreserve writes with an excerpt from a site dedicated to laws affecting wine: "[L]ast week, Australia signed an agreement with the European Union to comply with the geographical indicator (GI) system of the EU. The new agreement replaces an agreement signed in 1994 between the two wine powers and protects eleven of the EU drink labels and 112 of the Australian GI's. Specifically, this means that many of the wine products produced in Australia that were previously labeled according to European names, such as sherry and tokay, will no longer be labeled under these names. Wine producers in Australia will have three years to 'phase out' the use of such names on labels. Australian labels that will be discontinued include amontillado, Auslese, burgundy, chablis, champagne, claret, marsala, moselle, port, and sherry."
Re:Australian Tokay makes me sad (Score:5, Interesting)
Continuing the name of that region? Almost no one disputes that the former Yugoslavian republic includes part of the historical region of Macedonia. It is simply a mere portion of that region, with the rest lying in Greece. What really started the beef between that region and Greece is the FYROM's appropriation of Alexander the Great and the traditional Macedonian sun symbol. Greeks say, "Hey, you're a bunch of Slavs. Slavs came in the 6th century AD, and this old stuff is all Ancient Greek, our heritage!". Inhabitants of the FYROM could say "Slavs came and imposed their language, but many of us are genetically descended from Alexander's people!"
Re:More EU stupidity. More AU cowtowing. (Score:2, Interesting)
well, Port is the name of the city from where Port wine comes from. And the same goes for many of those names. Of course it is wrong to call a wine Port when it doesn't come from where it says! It's the same as if someone started labelling their products "proudly made in the US" when they weren't, as long it still "felt like a u.s. product" (which is basically your argument).
The generic name for Port-like wines is "fortified wine" and not "Port". "Scotch whiskey" is whiskey that comes from Scotland, and not a generic name of a drink. Champagne is a "sparkling wine" that comes from Champagne. It's not that hard to understand.
Re: The Macedonian naming problem (Score:3, Interesting)
Now that's an idea. Let FYR Macedonia change name to North Macedonia, it's less of a mouthful and geographically accurate.
Somehow, though, I have my doubts that the Greeks will take to it.
Re:Dont't like the idea anyway... (Score:4, Interesting)
This is not a nationalistic/rationalistic thing. Have you tried to take Furmint grapes and plant them say, in Norway? [For the less knowledgeable, it is too far North for this plant]
I am being extreme but illustrating the main point: a wine is not only the grapes: it is the weather and the soil (and many other factors, actually). This is why most wine is also known by the year: "good" or "bad" years mostly influenced by that years's climate on a specific place.
Australia has lots of wine variety. It can stand on its own merits. There is no need to hijack names for other places, that actually mean (and taste) different.
Re:Dont't like the idea anyway... (Score:3, Interesting)
"Terroir" is going to be shot to hell by climate change. Sure, you'll still have soil--Chablis is described as flinty, for instance--, but those notes will play second fiddle to temperature and rainfall.
Re:Australian Tokay makes me sad (Score:3, Interesting)
They're there to help the artisan vintners, cheesemakers and other food manufacturers. It's to prevent the giant companies spotting a product is becoming popular and make their own version for half the price (and a quarter the quality) and giving it the same name.
Artisan vintners like Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton?
Artisan vintners can easily trademark whatever name they're selling under as long as it hasn't already become genericized. This isn't about spotting new products on the rise, it's about redefining words that have already become well-established umbrella terms for certain styles, and it's pure protectionism.
Champagne and port have been in the dictionary as generic terms for centuries. Just from the standpoint of IP law, pulling them out of the public domain where they've safely landed and re-protecting them is even dumber than retroactive copyright extensions--and even worse (IMO) is the attempt to legally redefine words that have widely used English meanings.
Re:Australian Tokay makes me sad (Score:3, Interesting)
Champagne and port have been in the dictionary as generic terms for centuries. Just from the standpoint of IP law, pulling them out of the public domain where they've safely landed and re-protecting them is even dumber than retroactive copyright extensions--and even worse (IMO) is the attempt to legally redefine words that have widely used English meanings.
During most of that time, port has been produced only in Portugal, and within europe, the term was already restricted and not in the public domain (due to the european PDO system).
I'm from Portugal. We're a small country whose economy is in a terrible state (much worse than the global economy). One of the few exports we depend on is port wine. If the name of the wine is usurped freely, uninformed consumers merely looking for "port wine" will buy the fake, more widely marketed stuff produced by wealthier companies in wealthier countries and we'll grow closer to being bankrupt.
Short memories (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:Australian Tokay makes me sad (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Australian Tokay makes me sad (Score:5, Interesting)
I beg your pardon?
The primary three varietals used are Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, and Pinot Meunier. These are all three used in lots of other wines.
Yes, there are six minor varietals which are allowed to be used according to INAO rules, but these are not used enough to deserve the 'often' qualifier in your statement.
Mart
Re:Perhaps not as much as you think (Score:4, Interesting)
It's certainly true, although not very common. I've done quite a bit of double-blind tasting. (Although, if you're comparing two vintages, nobody tells you what you're looking for, and you figure out what the difference actually is, that's pretty good.) For particularly strange years or for regions that have a lot of weather variability from year to year (France, but not California), it can be entirely possible to discern the difference between two vintages. It's often not even particularly difficult. It's just uncommon that people bother to compare two vintages side-by-side.
Re:Perhaps not as much as you think (Score:3, Interesting)
One big difference though... You can train your taste buds to be more sensitive, or learn to discern more subtle differences than the untrained lay person. Whole industries depend on such "tasters", wine being one. Most distilleries, large coffee companies, ice cream companies, etc... depend on trained tasters. I rather doubt it is all a bunch of woo when several billion dollar industries depend on the advice of these people.
When I was in college I hung out with the hotel and restaurant management majors, and participated in their wine club. To pass their bar and bev requirement that had to do blind taste-tests, and be able to discern various vintages and regions by taste alone. And I managed to see them do this first hand in the club meeting, where I could barely tell various varieties apart.
Its about training. Your musician friends often hear music vary different than you do, and may be able to discern more nuance than you, just by experience and training. This has nothing to do with audiophile woo, but just normal experience and training.
Yes, often wine price points, and all the "we're wine insiders" stuff is idiotic and serves only to create an in group, or better marketting. At the same club, for the first year we told people all about what they were drinking, and then allowed them to rate the wine after the tasting. More expensive wines always won over cheap wines, foreign wines always won over domestic wines. The second no information was disclosed before tasting and rating. As a result the cheaper (9.99) wine tied with premium wines. My favorite was a 9.99 merlot tied with a $150 (wholesale) bottle of good vintage merlot. Generally the cheap stuff never beat the expensive stuff, but it often came very close.
Napa Valley, China (Score:4, Interesting)
What it showed the world is that the US only cares about trademarks when it's to their benefit.
This is true. I recall a few years ago when the EU's appellation rules were being enforced. There was an interview with a douchbag former VC wine Napa Valley "investor" who was "incensed" that the EU was restraining his trade by limiting what he could call his wine during export. Everything was going swimmingly until the EU winemaker, who had as usual been dumped on by the US interviewer and the douchbag for being some kind of crypto-socialist, produced a bottled wine variety with the appellation of "NAPA VALLEY" in huge letters, and in tiny letters "China", telling them he had bought it at a trade show a few weeks ago. Needless to say, the Napa Valley douchbag didn't think this was fair *at all*, and wanted a stop to this sort of thing.
Pot, meet kettle.