Bordeaux Warming

Filed in archive French Wines on April 1, 2007

While I still don't buy into the Chicken Little belief that we humans are responsible for global warming, I do believe it's happening. In fact, just the other day my husband mentioned he'd read something that suggest by the year 2050 parts of Florida would be under water. That means we had better find a rich Yankee to sell our house too before then! Another areas with significant concerns is the Bordeaux region.

From Wine industry feels the heat:

A hot year is normally associated with a vintage year for wine growers but global warming could, by the end of the century, have adverse effects and already poses a major challenge to vineyards in southern France and California.
"The first studies on the consequences of global warming show that warming favours the quality of the wine, said Gregory Jones, an Associate Professor of Geography at the American University of Southern Oregon.

Speaking at a conference on the impact of global warming on the wine industry in this wine-making city, he continued that "in the future, warming could become disastrous in numerous regions".

He said the threat might come from a series of challenges, citing problems with irrigation, diseases, and soil erosion resulting from flooding.

For his part, Bernard Sequin, from the French National Institute for Agricultural Research, said: "Heat, it's sometimes a good thing, up to a certain threshold."

The heatwave which hit Europe in 2003 gave some idea of what is in store in the future.