Earlier this year South Africa, among other countries, decided to ban alcohol sales to prevent people to spread the Covid-19 virus. President Cyril Ramaphosa stated that the peak of infection is ahead and that this measure in necessary to save lives.
Even if the Covid-19 pandemic tends to go back under control in some countries, there still are some cluster where a spike of contamination can be found. Napa Valley is one of those cluster and measures were taken to prevent further spreading of the virus.
According to a IWSR analysis, wine sales are likely to drop by up to 13.6% worldwide during 2020. It would also appear that the recovery for the wine sector could take longer than the beer and spirit business.
As stated by the European Commission, the wine sector is "among the hardest hit agri-food sectors” due to the Covid-19 pandemic. And the losses were “not compensated by home consumption”.
This is why the Commission announced new measures to support the wine business.
In order to protect their products, winegrowers over the world had to protect their wine from unlegitimate usage. Over the centuries, it seems that the designated way of protection for a product was its name.
Then one understand the absolut necessity of the strong protection of a product's name by a the legal way.
The article from winespectator dives in the details of such protection.
Labelling is a widely debated topic in the wine industry. Its importance is not to prove and the elements that should mandatory be on a label are debated. WHO just published a synthesis on the european practices, the barriers and facilitators to development and implementation of alcohol labelling policy which includes health and nutritional informations.
Struggle against wine counterfeit exist since the very beginning of its creation and one of the main issue producers and lawyers have to fight against.
An Australian company designed a technology usisng blockchain that might help to prevent such counterfeit.
The Covid-19 pandemic disrupted a lot of industries, along which, the wine sector. The impact of the pandemic is even stronger on the Souther Hemisphere vineyard as it striked as the harvest was about to begin. The OIV gathered data on the crisis management and the decisions that are necessery to learn from.
With the enforcement of the Geneva Act of the Lisbon Agreement, the Federal Concil proposed that Swirtzerland accedes to the Geneva Act, allowing a way easier process of registration for the Switz's appellations of origin.
Whilst the Covid-19 epidemic hits the balance of the wine sector, some country decided to dedicate a part of their budget to support the business. France decided to financially support the local producers.
© 2020 Wine & Law Program — Université de Reims