Ideal weather, grapes well supllied: the beginning of the harvests leads to predict a "high-quality" vintage for wines in 2016, even in the regions where the climatic hazards caused since the beginning of spring, a strong reduction of the volumes.
"Globally, we are going to be with high-quality wines ", estimated Jérôme Despey, specialized president of council wine of the public institution FranceAgriMer. The Bordelais, Alsace, Beaujolais or still Jura are in a good shape with besides the equivalent volumes in the last year, even superiors.
For other regions, " it is an atypical year in term of potential of production bound to hazards. Mainly, we notice it in the Champagne, Burgundy, in the region Val de Loire, in the Charente and in Languedoc-Roussillon. The Ministry of Agriculture planned at the end of August a reduction in 10 % of the French production with 42,9 million hectoliters.
Even within regions, strong disparities exist. In Burgundy, as in champagne, the frost, the hail, the mildew or the esca (disease of the wood) decimated certain plots of land, while " others offer beautiful healthy clusters ", according to the interprofessional Office of burgundy wines which plans spread harvests " so that every plot of land reaches the optimal maturity ".
" Where there is a little harvest, it will be a beautiful vintage in preparation with a good content in sugar ", specified Christine Monamy, person in charge of the Monitoring center of the Vintage. The wine growers plan on average a reduction from 20 to 27 %. So in Chablis, of which near half of the vineyard was strongly damaged by the various episodes of frost and hail, only " a half-harvest " is expected.
Le Figaro