The recently announced move towards the creation of National Wine Board finally gives some hope of clear direction and organisation of the sunshine wine industry, which will help build  Brand India, asserts Ashwini Patil Avate.

It is important to have a clear holistic vision for the Indian Wine Industry to be able to build this brand both domestically and internationally. We have to create a profitable domestic market that will benefit our agrarian society and at the same time building international market to “export our sunshine to the world”. We have a lot to learn from the Australian wine industry Strategy.

Due to the unprecedented change in the global wine trading conditions, India needs to reassess the priorities and challenges faced presently and the possible challenges of the future. Wine is being subjected to a significantly more competitive global trading environment and has been confronted by non uniform government policies. Soon there will an imbalance between its supply and its demand and we will soon be up hard against the realities of climate change.

VISION FOR BUILDING THE WINE STRATERGY:          

The Proposed Indian wine board should formulate a strategy for the next twenty-five years which should identify clearly the aims and objectives of the industry. Some clear aims are listed herewith:

    (a) Increase the value of the Indian wine trade over a target period.

    (b) Make the Indian Wine industry a sustainable industry.

    (c) Create a reputation of making world class wines exploiting our rich soils, sun, rain and abundant human resource.

    (d) Educate our farmer in growing wine grape varieties with a planned futuristic vision.

SCOPING THE CHALLENGE:        

The wine board would need to design a comprehensive blueprint for Indian wine industry to achieve a sustainable return for its grape growers and wine producers. It has to deliver a broad and sustainable strategy based on a clear understanding of such matters as market change, climate change, the environment and vine health. This will be crucial to help organize this nascent industry in a uniform planned manner. The envisaged challenges would be as follows

    (a) Building a uniform wine policy applicable throughout the country

    (b) Building Brand India

    (c) Proper demarcation of wine growing regions keeping in mind the effects of global warming.

    (d) Developing new areas better suited for the Wine growing.

    (e) Researching domestic and international market trends. It is equally important to predict future trends based on reasoning and study. An online research site could provide detailed market intelligence with an elevated priority towards economic, climatic and viticultural research.

    (f) Researching farming techniques to suit our soils and climate are the need of the hour. What grapes suit our terroir best is an important subject. Should we continue to grow French/international varietals or is there more benefit in also experimenting with some Indian varietals?

    (g) Developing indigenous varieties that will help us create our own distinct style of wines that can be labeled “Terroir India”.

    (h) Organisational support bodies to be formed at each level of the production chain to guide and advice based on our unified vision of building quality “brand India”. There has to be clear emphasis on the roles of the various industry structures and research organisations. There has to be coordination of activities of various national, state and regional bodies and associations to streamline a high-level and consistent approach to the sector and to the market.

    (i) The board will need to provide a platform for technology and knowledge transfer from world-leading range of resources for wine producers and growers that will assist the making of correct strategic decisions based on detailed information on market opportunities, consumer trends, financial sustainability and proven risk management strategies. It will help sector participants to adopt the most effective and efficient practices and to expand their businesses based on sustainable, long-term principles.

    (j) It has to engage in establishment of teaching institutions (Centres of excellence) to create more human resource for the wine industry and for future industry leaders.

Immediate Action.  

Some areas that need immediate actions by this organisation would be:

    (a) Classification of wines in terms of the area they come from or geographical indication system. (We can pick up clues from the existent European systems. Spain, France and Italy they all have their own system of categorising the wine produced domestically).

    (b) Categorising wines in terms of varietals or blends.

    (c) Clear rules for front and back labelling.

Future planning based on current reality:

We should conceptualise Indian Wine Strategy 2030 which could represent the best opportunity to secure the future of Indian wine through economic prosperity, environmental sustainability, technological innovation and social responsibility by timely planning. The Indian wine sector needs to re-evaluate its current approach towards domestic production and export markets. Further, it also needs to refocus its expectations in the domestic Indian market and introduce new strategies to encourage more Indians to drink better wine more frequently while still observing sensible and moderate consumption patterns. Most importantly, this Strategy 2030 should be about improving success and return on investment at an individual enterprise level.

We need to maintain records of evolution over the last decade of wine industry. This will show us the general trend in the growth of the industry and at the same time bring to focus certain areas that need urgent attention. Data probably already exists but we need to study it in this given clear context with emphasis to:

Today we are fighting the foreign wines entering the Indian market under the pretence of protecting our own farmers and wine producers. But is this a good strategy to follow? Isn’t it a better idea to open market for better quality wines, for a healthy competition between domestic and international wines and thus give our consumers a feel of what good wine is all about. Having done that, nothing stops us from making international quality wines and exports our wines to the world.

China is a recent entrant into the world of wines but is already the second largest country to grow wine grapes, and all this has happened in the last decade and a half. Today the whole wine world is looking at China, and it might dominate also the wine world. India like China has the advantage of cheap labour, plentiful sunshine, water and rich soils.

What we need to do is have the aim to make good quality wines, build self confidence, open our markets to international wines and in turn export our wines internationally. Our wines will always be competitive in terms of price due to comparatively low cost of production as compared to Europe or other New World Wine producing nations like Australia and the quality will represent “Terroir India”!

The author is a consultant on Wines: Viticulture, Oenology and Wine Marketing. She has lived in Europe for over five years and has an International Masters Degree in Vine, Wine and Terroir Management from Ecole Supérieur d'Agriculture d'Angers, France in co-ordination with, University of Piacenza, Italy and University of Valencia, Spain. You could write to her on patashwini@gmail.com

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