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Chinese wine tasters enjoy shock win in France

Chinese wine tasters sipped their way to victory on Saturday at a blind tasting competition in France, sealing a win that organisers described as a "thunderbolt in the world of wine."

Published: 10 October 2016 08:25 CEST
Chinese wine tasters enjoy shock win in France
A participant from China tastes a wine during last year's World Blind Wine Tasting Championships. Photo: AFP
The Chinese team beat out the French and Americans at the Chateau du Galoupet, one of the country's biggest wine estates.
   
A total of 21 teams took part, during the fourth world blind tasting championships held by French specialist magazine La Revue du vin de France.
  
Belgium, the runner-up last year, came fourth while former champion Spain were placed a distant tenth.
   
The teams from around the world had to identify the wines' countries of origin, the grape varieties used in them, their appellations and their vintages.
   
“Remaining humble even in victory, the astounding Chinese team conceded that in blind tasting 50 percent is knowledge and 50 percent is luck,” the organisers said.
   
Next year's championships will be held in Burgundy in the famed Cote d'Or wine-growing region.
 
 
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FARMING

Cold snap ‘could slash French wine harvest by 30 percent’

A rare cold snap that froze vineyards across much of France this month could see harvest yields drop by around a third this year, France's national agriculture observatory said on Thursday.

Published: 22 April 2021 15:09 CEST
Cold snap 'could slash French wine harvest by 30 percent'
A winemaker checks whether there is life in the buds of his vineyard in Le Landreau, near Nantes in western France, on April 12th, following several nights of frost. Photo: Sebastien SALOM-GOMIS / AFP

Winemakers were forced to light fires and candles among their vines as nighttime temperatures plunged after weeks of unseasonably warm weather that had spurred early budding.

Scores of vulnerable fruit and vegetable orchards were also hit in what Agriculture Minister Julien Denormandie called “probably the greatest agricultural catastrophe of the beginning of the 21st century.”

IN PICTURES: French vineyards ablaze in bid to ward off frosts

The government has promised more than €1 billion in aid for destroyed grapes and other crops.

Based on reported losses so far, the damage could result in up to 15 million fewer hectolitres of wine, a drop of 28 to 30 percent from the average yields over the past five years, the FranceAgriMer agency said.

That would represent €1.5 to €2 billion of lost revenue for the sector, Ygor Gibelind, head of the agency’s wine division, said by videoconference.

It would also roughly coincide with the tally from France’s FNSEA agriculture union.

Prime Minister Jean Castex vowed during a visit to damaged fields in southern France last Saturday that the emergency aid would be made available in the coming days to help farmers cope with the “exceptional situation.”

READ ALSO: ‘We’ve lost at least 70,000 bottles’ – French winemakers count the cost of late frosts

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