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Reserves to be used to supplement reduced Chablis vintage

Published:  13 October, 2016

Reserves from vintage 2015 will be used to supplement reduced yields from this year's harvest in Chablis following disastrous weather in April this year.

Reserves from vintage 2015 will be used to supplement reduced yields from this year's harvest in Chablis following disastrous weather in April this year.

Thanks to record-breaking frost and hailstorms which cut Chablis production by half, this year, stocks from the 2015 vintage in reserve will be used - although there is not enough stock to compensate for the total volume lost.

Burgundy winemakers expect harvest volumes will be down at least 50% this year in Chablis.

"The situation is a commercial set-back for Chablis, because the reduced volumes will mean that some of us may not be able to honour our orders," Louis Moreau, vice president of the Bourgogne Wine Board (BIVB) explained.

"However, we have some stock from last year's vintage which will be added to the volume available from 2016, which will mitigate in some way the losses in volume this year. Our key message to our customers in the UK and other markets is please bear with us. We want to maintain our good relationships with our valued clients into 2017 and beyond."

In good harvests, it is standard practice to put a certain volume of wine into reserve in case the following vintage is low.

These reserve stocks can only be used to supplement the following vintage and act as a price-regulating mechanism, if the following vintage volume is lower than the legal minimum.

Chablis' producers and negociants were some of the first to implement an annual system of storing reserve stocks of wine, known as Volume Complémentaire Individuel (VCI), which has now been adopted in other regions in France.

Although harvest volumes are expected to be down at least 50% in 2016, winemakers have said the quality is likely to be very good thanks to favourable weather conditions in September.

As a result of this year's challenges, BIVB has reported the region's winemakers are investing in new methods and techniques to combat frost and hail damage.

Traditional heaters have long been used around the vineyards and also spraying, where water turns to ice around the buds creating a protective cocoon against frost.

But producers are now studying two additional damage-control methods - cold cloud seeding, and anti-hail nets.

Cold cloud seeding, also known as glaciogenic seeding, involves firing silver iodide into clouds to trigger the formation of ice crystals which create smaller hail stones, which then melt in the atmosphere before they reach the ground.

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