EVEN WINE IS POLITICAL: FOLLOWING THE UKRAINE CRISIS IN 2014, MOSCOW CLOSED ITS DOORS TO WESTERN AGRIFOOD (BUT NOT WINE), AND RUSSIANS HAVE REDISCOVERED THE PLEASURE OF LOCAL PRODUCTIONS, WHICH GREW 25% IN 2015

In Russia today, even wine is political and has a symbolic value of increasingly exasperated patriotism, created from the clash between Moscow and the West in 2014, when it seemed the Ukraine crisis could have lead to Civil War. Since then, the situation has slowly deteriorated between East and West, and like in the Cold War, they have decided to fight with the weapons of economic embargoes and mutual sanctions and in the end, wine is one of the few agribusiness products still imported without restrictions.
Yet, there has been a backlash: the Russians, in these last two years of trade war, have rediscovered the pleasure of domestic wine and food partly because of the economic crisis the country is facing, of which Vladimir Putin’s government carefully avoids speaking.
Wine production in the country has been revived and even grew 25% in 2015 compared to 2014, as one of the most influential US newspapers, "The Wall Street Journal" (www.wsj.com) revealed. And things are not going differently in 2016, thanks to the re-conquest, through a controversial referendum, of Crimea, a real gem of Russian wine.
Massandra was once the largest winery of the Empire that under Ukrainian control had fallen, as had the whole region, "out of favor", while the Russian government has decided to invest highly to re-launch it, through an expansion policy, which would make the peninsula a reference point, both quality and quantity-wise for the entire Russian wine production.
However, this does not mean that the entire import share can be substituted in a short period of time by indigenous production, though certainly wine makes one feel a bit more patriotic, thanks to the rediscovery of those indigenous varieties that exist only in Russia.
And this, of course, means that the oligarchs in Moscow, who in recent years had begun to invest in France, California and Italy, are making a rapid about face and bringing their capital back home. They are focusing on the growth of Russian wine investments; for example, the giant Abrau Dyurso, established in 2006 that has seen sales grow 17% in 2015, is focusing on bubbles, to offer an domestic alternative to Champagne lovers. There is still a long way to go, but the Russians are certain that in a few years, Europeans and Americans will be buying Russian wine, just as the Russians, for decades, have bought wine from the Old World.