Include more countries, improve institutional relations and add value to wine, Melchor challenges leading RECEVIN.

 

Castilla-La Mancha today recovers the Law of the Wine Vineyard, a regulation debated in the regional courts and that has come hand in hand with the Government of Castilla-La Mancha with work with the entire sector to “defend the interests of the most representative sector of our land”.

This was said this morning by the Minister of Agriculture, Water and Rural Development, Francisco Martínez Arroyo, in his speech in the Cortes, where he thanked all representatives of the sector for their assistance supporting this regulation because “it was necessary for us in Castilla-La Mancha to pass this law”. Although, he remarked, “we should not be approving it today, it should be in force” and is that the previous Law of the Vine and Wine was repealed, he recalled, in 2012 with the PP and Castilla-La Mancha “was left without law” by an “ideological roll of good”when it is the region with the largest area in the world, with the most processed products and the most economic interests.

This legislation, which comes justified by the importance of the wine sector in Castilla-La Mancha, the most significant in the agri-food sector due to its social, economic, environmental, territorial, cultural and heritage implications, It represents about five per cent, per se, of the Community’s gross domestic product.

The counselor has put on the table the data that corroborate it. More than 450,000 hectares of vineyards placing the region in the first nationwide extension; 80,000 families behind, and a crop that employs 43,000 workers and has 484 wineries (205 of them cooperatives), with an average production of 23 million hectolitres on average so “we are the winery of the world” and in which “every time we bill more, we win markets”.

The Strategic Plan of the wine sector of Castilla-La Mancha of February 2019, analyzed the situation of the regional sector and proposed a roadmap to guarantee its future in the medium and long term, including the creation of this regulation, “result of work of the sector and with the academy of Castilla-La Mancha, with our public university”. In this way, he recalled, “we set out to invoice 2.500 million euros in 2025 and today invoice 2.000”.

The Law of the Vine and Wine will try to respond to the needs of the wine sector. Parallel to this law, said Martínez Arroyo today, is working on a new Law of Agri-food Quality in Castilla-La Mancha that will apply to wine in issues that are common to other agri-food products, especially in quality figures.

Novelty

The new regulation includes new mentions on the labelling, different to those that have been used so far, as toponyms of greater or lesser scope than the geographical indication where the winery is located. In particular, the new concept of ‍finca wine’ is included for the first time in Spain in a regulation, which will allow to elaborate for the first time the wine with vines from a winery within the same denomination of origin, including this concept and that of the OJ on labelling.

The vineyard, remarked Martínez Arroyo, “vertebra” the region and “if not for the wine sector Castilla-La Mancha would not be what it is”.

This law reflects the authorization of new vine varieties in Castilla-La Mancha; it includes oenological practices that were not previously regulated or the creation of an interprofessional regional wine at the request of the sector itself.

In it, Martínez Arroyo has highlighted the commitment to digitization and for the first time in this same campaign there will be digitization in the books of winery, something that will be increasing, within the work in this line driven by the Government hand in hand with the regional University to reach the entire sector the application of Blockchain technology to identify products from consumption to origin with a QR code.

The Minister of Agriculture has also referred to the implementation of new aid for the oldest strains in the community, with 26 million euros, within the Rural Development Program, with 100 euros per hectare to increase the profitability of a vineyard, which, “otherwise, I wouldn’t have it”.

Representatives of different denominations of origin in the region, such as La Mancha, Uclés, Manchuela and Ribera del Júcar, representatives of agro-food cooperatives, Asaja UPA and COAG attended the debate on this regulation from the rostrum of the plenary hall; of ADEVIN; of the Spanish Wine Federation; of the unions CCOO and UGT or of the University of Castilla-La Mancha itself.

 

SOURCE: LIBERALDECASTILLA.COM