In Asia, Himalayas predicted to see more growth in wine production, along with Pamirs
A vineyard and medieval church in Alsace, France. Photo: iStock Climate change is transforming the geography of wine production. So, while you may have been accustomed to consuming the best vintages from Bordeaux, Alsace, Napa Valley or Stellenbosch, be ready to trade them for Kent, Kenya or the Pamirs & Himalayas in the future, says a new study.
The researchers, led by Cornelis van Leeuwen of the Université de Bordeaux, segmented each continent and its wine-producing areas into macro-regions defined by specific climate-driven conditions.
“…we estimate a substantial risk of unsuitability (ranging from moderate to high) for 49-70 per cent of existing wine regions, contingent on the degree of global warming. Simultaneously, 11-25 per cent of existing wine regions might experience enhanced production with rising temperatures, and new suitable areas might emerge at higher latitudes and altitudes,” van Leeuwen and others noted.
The assessments are based an exhaustive literature review and exhibit specific features across continents.
Currently, vineyards sprawl across most of the ‘mid-latitudes’, temperate zones extending from about 30 to 60 degrees north or south of the equator.
They include California, the richest US state; southern (Mediterranean) France; northern Spain and Italy (Po river valley); Barossa, Australia; Stellenbosch, South Africa; and Mendoza, Argentina, among others.
Here, the climate is warm enough to allow grape ripening, but without excessive heat, and relatively dry to avoid strong disease pressure.
But the warming planet is changing all that.
Perhaps the greatest change is going to be in Europe, the primary producer of premium wine worldwide.
The world’s second-smallest continent is warming rapidly. A recent study by the European Environment Agency (EEA) noted that Europe is the fastest warming continent in the world.
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The European part of the Mediterranean littoral is going to be particularly impacted by global warming. “In southern Europe, annual precipitation and summer rainfall are projected to decrease, whereas aridity, droughts and fire hazards are all likely to increase,” the EEA study pointed out.
All this will impact wine production.
“Under low levels of global warming (<2°C), most traditional wine-producing regions will maintain suitability, albeit contingent on the implementation of adaptation measures, notably in southern Europe,” said the study.
Rising temperatures and reduced rainfall will induce severe risk of drought over south Iberia, Mediterranean France and Spain, the Po Valley, coastal Italy, the Balkan Peninsula and the southwestern Black Sea regions.
However, a severe warming scenario could spell disaster for the region’s wine industry. According to the study, most Mediterranean regions could become climatically unsuitable for wine production in such conditions.
“…vineyards below 45° N might be so challenged that the only feasible adaptation would be to relocate to higher altitudes,” it warned.
Ninety per cent of southern Europe’s traditional wine regions situated in the lowlands and coastal regions of Spain, Italy and Greece could be at risk of disappearing by the end of the century.
The study calculated that only a minor portion of this loss (less than 20 per cent) could be potentially compensated for by shifting vineyards towards mountainous areas, considering elevations of up to 1,000 m.
But even as traditional wine regions may suffer, some may benefit. These include Galicia on Spain’s ‘green coast’ on the Atlantic as well as the northern Balkans.
Meanwhile, “new wine regions are expected to expand northward, notably along the Atlantic sector”.
The biggest beneficiary of this could be the United Kingdom. “Vineyard area in the United Kingdom has expanded approximately 400 per cent between 2004 and 2021, and studies predict emerging viticultural suitability across large portions of the country,” the study stated.
Wine production would be coming back to Britain after millennia. It existed in Roman Britain, according to the researchers since “climate conditions in the Northern Hemisphere were almost as warm as 1960-1990”.
Viticulture disappeared from the island in the 1500s as imports from abroad increased as well as persistent cold conditions due to the so-called Little Ice Age.
The scenario is not good for traditional wine regions on other continents as well.
In North America, California — home to Napa Valley — will take a hit.
Coastal California’s winemakers “will face increasing risks of drought, heatwaves and wildfires, necessitating the proactive adoption of adaptation measures. If global warming exceeds 2°C, coastal California will transition to a very warm and arid climate for viticulture, probably resulting in a decline in wine quality and economic sustainability”.
The same is predicted for inland and southern California.
“Overall, the net suitable area for wine production in California could decline by up to 50 per cent by the end of the twenty-first century,” the research said.
Vineyards in Mexico, the US Southwest and the US east coast south of New Jersey also face similar risk.
Meanwhile, like in Europe, vineyards will shift northwards to New British Columbia, Washington State, Oregon on the west coast and the Great Lakes region and New England on the east coast.
In South America, wine production may shift to higher slopes of the Andes range under a severe warming scenario. This will include the Argentinian section of Patagonia as well as the Ecuadorian and Colombian Andes.
The study also estimated the risk to traditional wine regions in the extreme north and south of Africa.
The researchers noted that the scientific literature on future wine production South Africa, where the wine industry is a legacy of French Huguenot settlers, is “limited, resulting in a low-confidence assessment of a moderate risk of suitability loss in both the more productive western region and the eastern region”.
For the North Africa section of the Mediterranean littoral (the Maghreb), the researchers predicted “a moderate-to-high risk of suitability loss”.
Future wine production in the Maghreb could shift to higher altitudes like the Atlas Mountains.
“Potential emerging wine regions in Africa include the highlands of Kenya and notably the highlands of Ethiopia, where the wine industry is in its early stage of development,” the study noted.
In Asia, eastern Anatolia (Asiatic Turkiye) and the Pamir-Himalayan Mountains show potential for future wine production, according to the study.
“One thing is certain: climate change will drive major changes in global wine production in the near future. Having the flexibility to adapt to these changes will be essential,” concluded the researchers.
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