Prosecco DOCG launches Green Academy and Wine Tourism lab

By James Bayley

Published: 19 December, 2022

To mark its 60th anniversary, the Consorzio of Conegliano Valdobbiadene Prosecco DOCG has announced the launch of two new initiatives. The first is a research facility called, The Green Academy, which will enable producers to work more efficiently for the benefit of the region environmentally.

The second is a Wine Tourism Lab; a campus designed to bring producers in the region together and to promote opportunities for young people in the area in relation to wine tourism.

“The Green Academy will allow us to exploit our knowledge as growers and the knowledge of experts in the various fields that sustainability involves,” commented the consortium’s president, Elvira Bortolomiol.

She added: “Our zone and our community are precious, and it is for them that we must use the best expertise and resources we have. Our aim is to sustain our own terroir and also to be a reference for other regions.”

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The Academy will study the most urgent environmental topics, and apply them to the region specifically.

Diego Tomasi, director of the Consorzio di Tutela del Conegliano Valdobbiadene Prosecco said: “First of all, climate change: we are already working together with Banca Prealpi and the University of Cantabria, with the objective of creating models for forecasting any extreme atmospheric events that may occur in our hills between the present and 2030, 2050 or even 2100”.

As part of the first initiative, The Green Academy has commissioned a group of renowned egyptologists to research how Egyptians from 3000 BC succeeded in cultivating vines in the extreme climatic conditions of that time. The results are expected in mid-2023 and the consorzio hopes they will contain examples of viticultural techniques that today’s winegrowers can adopt for coping with climate change.

“We are already doing something tangible about drought,” Tomasi said, “by focusing our attention on recuperating, conserving and reusing rain and spring water.”

In addition, the second initiative launched by the DOCG, is a newly created Wine Tourism Lab, with the dual objective to link professionals in the region and to create greater awareness among young people of the opportunities the area has to offer. The focus will be on wine, and the landscape, beauty, food, leisure and nature of the region - all elements that fall under the umbrella of wine tourism.

The consorzio is promoting activities that express the quality of its terroir through the cultural and educational development of the future generations that run the Conegliano Valdobbiadene zone.

Tomasi added: “We must have a wider and more far-sighted vision of the Denomination’s potential, whilst being aware that Conegliano Valdobbiadene Prosecco Superiore DOCG will always represent the flagship of these hills and that it is the wine that will give rise to new economic opportunities.

“The consorzio is now laying the foundations for increasing knowledge within the region, especially as regards hospitality that highlights the winemaking heart of the region. To achieve this objective, we will focus on training all the professionals involved so that the level of what is offered stands out for its high quality and its ability to stay ahead of the game when it comes to wine tourism.”

Other initiatives undertaken by the consorzio include financing the creation of small basins for collecting water, a project run in conjunction with The University of Padua; and an initiative to recover water diverted from the River Piave with the Municipalities in the Denomination, trade bodies, and the Association for Reclamation of the Left Bank of the Piave.

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