Slow Wine Fair 2024: where viticulture is good example for a new agriculture

“The Slow Wine Fair pursues an important and ambitious goal: to change the approach to agriculture through wine production. The 1,000 wineries in Slow Wine Fair have long made a precise choice, which goes in the direction of drastically reducing or completely eliminating synthetic chemicals; they also use environmental resources in a conscious and sustainable way, mirror their terroir of origin, whose biodiversity they preserve, and are engines of social growth in their respective communities”. Words from Giancarlo Gariglio, editor of the Slow Wine guide and coordinator of the Slow Wine Coalition, today in the presentation of the final program of the Slow Wine Fair 2024, in Bologna, February 25-27. “More than 50% of the wineries are certified organic or biodynamic and clearly indicate how to do agriculture in a profitable and sustainable way, taking care of soil fertility, the leading theme of this third edition, the health of the environment and people. Indeed”, explains Giancarlo Gariglio, “a healthy soil constitutes the essential basis of the economy, society and the environment, as it produces food, increases our resilience to climate change and promotes our well-being. The professionals and enthusiasts who will gather in the pavilions of BolognaFiere are the true ambassadors of this profound change, which we must perforce imprint on our agricultural system”.
“In the last 10 years, organic vine areas have increased by 145%”, stresses Maria Grazia Mammuccini, FederBio president, “and organic viticulture covers an area of almost 136,000 hectares, 19% of the entire national viticulture, with peaks touching 38% in highly vocated regions such as Tuscany, where, in Chianti Classico, organic vineyards have now exceeded 50% of the total. Organic viticulture represents an excellent example of resilience and adaptation to the climate crisis, simultaneously helping to preserve soil fertility and ecosystems. It represents a virtuous model capable of combining the value of the territorial identity of our country’s appellations of origin with that of organic sustainability. At Slow Wine Fair, which consolidates the FederBio-Slow Food-BolognaFiere partnership, we organized an event dedicated to organic viticulture as a production method to deal with climate impacts: in this event we will present concrete examples of monitoring biodiversity and soil quality. These examples make it possible to design an agronomic strategy to create a “vineyard system” capable of responding to climate shocks using the critical elements. This allows for innovative solutions based on agroecology and capable of increasing the resilience of plants in their environment”.
Organized by BolognaFiere and Sana, Salone Internazionale del Biologico e del Naturale, under the artistic direction of Slow Food , Slow Wine Fair was born from the combination of BolognaFiere’s 30 years of experience in the organic world with Sana and Slow Food’s historic commitment to the themes of biodiversity, environmental sustainability and social equity: “with Slow Wine Fair, BolognaFiere continues on its path of creating expo projects dedicated to the food service and horeca business community”, says Domenico Lunghi, Director of Direct Exhibitions BolognaFiere, “the theme of sustainability is a priority for us, as testified by the experience gained in no less than thirty-five editions of Sana, the only trade fair event of reference for organic products in Italy. This is why we have launched a strategic alliance with Slow Food, also involving FederBio, a longstanding partner. Slow Wine Fair 2024 shows that, in three editions, this project has already established itself as one of the main platforms in Europe for sustainable and organic wines. The decision, taken in 2023, to expand the product references for the horeca, extending the possibility of participation to spirits and bitters, is also confirmed as very valid. And increasingly innovative is the space dedicated to a selection of manufacturers of advanced technological solutions, plants, equipment and services related to the wine supply chain, the true partners of sustainability”.