Wine and market, the Bolgheri DOC requires the Region of Tuscany 190hectares more to grow

The management of the production potential of wine, the area of the denominations and, finally, the management of the balance between production and market, is a challenging issue. Apart from the EU regulation on authorisations for new plantings, which currently allows the Member States to increase the area planted with vines by 1% per year - an aspect which for some time has raised doubts and criticisms for the denominations - in order to increase production levels, regardless of the seasonal and climatic aspects, there are two possible ways: increasing yields per hectare, to be regulated, or reopening the Vineyard Register.
On this road, in Tuscany, the Consorzio Vini Bolgheri Doc (Bolgheri DOC Wines Consortium) that protect one of the most successful Italian denominations in the world, as also shown by the values of the vineyards which, according to WineNews estimates, are around 400,000 euros per hectare.
After a very rapid expansion, which saw the denomination increase from 250 hectares at the end of the 90’s to the current 1,319 hectares, as we read on the Consortium’s website, the Region of Tuscany asked for “the concession of 120 hectares of new claimable surface for the denomination Bolgheri red typologies and 70 hectares for the denomination Bolgheri white typologies”. Important numbers, with an increase that, if granted, would mean more than 10% more vineyards claimable under the designation.
Which, potentially, would benefit “estates already established on 31 July 2018 and with vineyards in operation suitable for the claim of the name Bolgheri on the same date”, but also, it states “wineries that do not hold surface area that can be claimed on the date of submission of the application”, as stated in the Bollettino Ufficiale della Regione Toscana of 6 February 2019. But, beyond the technical terms, and the fact that the request is accepted or not, it is an important signal, with one of the best performing names of the wine of Tuscany and Italy that asks for the possibility to grow by reopening, in fact, its Register of Vineyards.
According to the rumors intercepted by WineNews, this route is likely to follow other important denominations of one of the most important wine regions in Italy. Together with the Region of Tuscany, which, moreover, would have invited all the Consortiums to draw up three-year programming plans, based on objective and measurable data, in order to reach the final goal, which is the market balance, moreover, with all the proposals on which, in any case, the last word belongs to the Region.