Rioja breakaway

[sjw_11]

I know there are a few Spanish wine lovers on here, so I thought to share this headline out of Spain... basically the Basque part of Rioja wants the right to stop calling their wines Rioja.

I think more broadly the debate over geographical indicators versus quality indicators or a combination versus simply having clear labelling about place/variety is always an interesting one.

"The Rioja Alavesa producers want to distinguish themselves on the grounds of quality, even if it means forsaking the internationally recognised Rioja brand name.

“Spain is Europe’s biggest wine exporter by volume but only the third in income, whereas France is only the third largest but its exports earn four times as much as Spain,” said Javier Ruiz de Galarreta, the president of a major group of exporters of Rioja Alavesa.

Supporters of the breakaway point to research that shows a trend towards consumers wanting to drink smaller amounts of higher-quality wine.

What they want is something similar to the French system, where there is a regional appellation contrôlée such as Bordeaux or Bourgogne but within it numerous smaller ones such as Médoc or Meursault. There are also further quality indicators such as premiers or grands crus.

Rioja also has its ratings of crianza, reserva and gran reserva but these are unreliable guides to quality and simply indicate the age of the wine.

“Quality is the key, not the time it’s spent in the bottle,” said Benjamín Romeo of Bodegas Contador in Rioja."

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/may/1 ... winemakers