Is there too much wine? Why some winemakers are ripping up vines and ‘don’t see a future in the wine industry’
- The world’s wine industry is feeling the effects of changing tastes, increased production costs, oversupply and depressed prices
- Some winemakers who are unable to make a profit are ripping up vines and replacing them with alternative crops, or returning land to its natural state
Australian grape grower Tony Townsend destroyed half of his 14-hectare (35-acre) vineyard last year.
The fields were healthy and vibrant, but he estimates he would have lost about A$35,000 (US$23,000) harvesting them. While a heatwave is holding him back from ripping out the rest, he plans to finish the job once the weather cools – losing all the vines he’s tended for the past decade.
“I enjoyed being in the wine industry, but it was just economically unviable to continue this way,” said Townsend from his farm, where a pile of discarded plants is waiting to be burned.
He lives in Riverland, a region in South Australia that produces about a third of the nation’s crush. Since 2020, a convergence of Covid-fuelled cost increases and Chinese tariffs has pushed up supply and depressed prices in the country.
While Townsend was never fully reliant on grape growing for his income and works part-time in wine and food tourism, not every farmer has been so lucky.
