The relationship wine/ alcohol, the law, the climate and more, according to Angelo Gaja

“For more than 20 years I’ve been saying that wine does not have to make war on other alcoholic beverages, but it does have to disconnect its image from that world. This is because messages like those from Lancet, which say alcohol is always damaging, at any level and in any quantity, leave traces in people - in Millennials- and we must not underestimate them. We need to say that wine is different; it’s another story, it’s another culture”. These are the words of Angelo Gaja, one of the most successful Italian wine producers, globetrotter and vigilant observer of the global wine market dynamics, at the presentation of Vinitaly’s international events, in Milan today. Gaja expounded an extreme synthesis of the concerns hovering over the Italian wine sector, which is flourishing and healthy, but must think about the future. “The Testo Unico (consolidated regulations) of wine is another aspect we must act quickly on, because it is stopped - no important decrees proposed and those that would have streamlined the bureaucracy have not gone forward. Trade associations must get busy, and do so quickly”. Then there is the important topic of climate change. “We suffered a serious defeat when Brussels recently established that mutagenesis and transgenesis are on the same level, so the entire project that was created to carry forward identifying new resistant varieties through transgenesis has been halted . Research is fundamental to identify varieties that can better defeat diseases, for example”. Another perpetual enemy of Italian wine, and not only, is Italian Sounding produced abroad. “The estimates say 65 billion euros a year damage real Made in Italy products, but I think we are still not aware of how many fake or non-regular products go on the markets and produced in Italy. The phenomenon is growing. Monitoring is not needed; instead, a wider system of collaboration on foreign markets is needed, because this can become a very serious risk”. Finally, one last warning: “more attention to tourism, as there are sacred places of wine where masses of people come, and we risk jeopardizing their identity”.