Too much wine, not enough money for winegrowers: as the new harvest arrives at the wineries, the allocation for the destruction of surplus will increase to reach 200 million euros, the Ministry of Agriculture announced on Friday.
Given the drop in consumption of red and rosé wines, this aid to the wine sector, described as crisis distillation, compensates producers who withdraw their wine from the market. This wine is transformed into alcohol that is not suitable for consumption and will end up, for example, in perfume or hydroalcoholic gel.
160 million euros for 3 million hectoliters distilled
The initial endowment, financed with French and European funds, was 160 million euros for 3 million distilled hectoliters, but the professionals requested an increase given the influx of candidates for distillation, mainly in Bordeaux and Languedoc.
It is about “guaranteeing that prices stop falling and that winegrowers find income”, declared the minister Marc Fesneau during a press conference, during a visit to a distillery in Hérault.
Decrease in supply
The Minister hopes that the aid will allow “alleviating a little (…) the difficult moment of crisis that wine growers are going through”. He also stressed that it is necessary to “project ourselves, think about changes in consumption (…) that we adapt” production to “tomorrow’s” demand and “anticipate exports” to find new outlets.
He fears a “catastrophic” situation after the harvest, with “the cellars already full” and the merchants “who can no longer sell a liter” for months due to the drop in consumption favored by inflation.
Il plaidait pour une diminution de l’offre via une campagne d’arrachage de vignes – as ce qui est prévu dans le Bordelais – “pour que les gens se recentrent sur ce qu’ils savent bien faire et qu’ils produisent ce qu’ they sell”.
Source: BFM TV
