(17 Nov 2019) LEAD IN: Last minute preparations are underway in the Beaujolais region ahead of the release of France's most famous young wine.
Beaujolais Nouveau producers are concerned about the impact US tariffs and increased competition will have on their industry.
But it seems the wine itself is tasting good this year.
STORY-LINE:
Production for one of the year's most anticipated wine events is underway.
The grapes making up the wine in these bottles were harvested by hand only a few weeks ago.
At the Vinescence wine production company, wine is being bottled and labelled ahead of the third Thursday of November, when winemakers and sellers are set to uncork the season's Beaujolais Nouveau with feasting and fanfare.
Beaujolais, a region spanning 55 kilometers (34 miles) north of Lyon, has spent decades marketing its wines globally.
It now exports to more than 110 countries, according to statistics from Vinescence, which works with 310 winemakers in the area.
"The market for Beaujolais Nouveau like the one you see here is a global market – the first market in the world being Japan. The French market is also very important but you'll find some around the world, from the United States to Northern Europe. Eastern Europe countries also drink a lot (of Beaujolais Nouveau)," says the General Director of Vinescence, Jean-Paul Civeyrac.
An idiosyncratic wine known for its youth, rather than its age, Beaujolais Nouveau has seen particular success.
But considerable uncertainty is clouding this year's celebration, as the French wine industry finds itself increasingly squeezed by unfavourable geopolitics and turbulent markets.
New American tariffs are denting profits. Brexit still looms. Unrest in Hong Kong has shaken that market. And China is turning to Chilean and Argentine wines instead.
The Trump administration imposed the 25 percent import tax on most French still wines last month as part of a trade spat with the European Union over illegal subsidies for the aircraft giant Airbus.
Orders had already been placed, and places on planes or boats reserved, for this year's Beaujolais Nouveau by the time the tariffs took effect.
Producers said they struck up arrangements to shoulder part of the cost themselves — and distribute most of the rest along the supply chain — in order to retain their American clientele.
Franck Duboeuf, president of the largest Beaujolais Nouveau producer in the world, says the recent market developments are worrying.
"It's clear that if we didn't have a presence with this year's Beaujolais Nouveau, it could disappear from the (US) market altogether with such important competition and also because it's like a rendez-vous. If you miss the rendez-vous, it could, in following years, jeopardise what you've worked hard to build in 40 years. It was crucial that we save this campaign… in the future, it's the entire 2019 production, an entire region, an entire sector (that are threatened) and it's extremely complicated and worrying," he says.
On top of the tariffs, uncertainty lingers around future trade with the United Kingdom, which is heading toward an early election December 12 that will determine the future of Brexit.
When and how Brexit takes shape could impact the wine trade down the line.
Changing tastes complicate the picture further.
The Japanese, who were buying a "tsunami" of Beaujolais a decade ago, seem to be losing their appetite for the wine, says the President of Beaujolais winemakers' association Dominique Piron.
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