A light at the end of the tunnel?

After the recent ruling of the WTO and few hundred more articles demanding the French change how they label their wines, I was starting to think there was no hope. Out of the blue comes this article.

"Australia is about to agree to a naming-rights policy that will end the use of many European names on Australian wines. But what will the favourite wines be called in future?"

Hip-Hip Hooray!! The Aussies may have figured it out. Maybe they can convince the rest of the world to follow suit.

I should say that I don't agree with Ben Canadier's tone in the article. He writes in a way that only reinforces the idea that wine professionals and enthusiasts alike are above the fray and the lowly drinker will never understand such things. Case in point:

"Indeed - and this is the point in a nutshell - if the wine came from Paris, Texas, it would be called sparkling wine. At least by right-minded wine professionals. They would never call it champagne."

Or how about this one?

"Yes, we name it that, but 90 per cent of people still call it champagne. Or fizz, or bubbles, or cheap bubbly, or giggle juice, or champas, or champas darl."

I am sitting here dumbfounded wondering what my response might be if someone came into my shop or the restaurant I used to work in and asked for a glass of 'giggle juice'. I know most people can't get enough of these cute Aussie terms but this is ridiculous. Cue the b.s.:

"If you think this is all perfectly ridiculous, you are in for even more fun with the EU and its latest piece of moral copyright. Port and sherry.

The names of those two drinks from Portugal and Spain, in that order. These words - not unlike champagne - are well-worn and time-honoured; they're more or less household names.

When drinkers and occasional drinkers see these words on a bottle's label, they know what's in the bottle. In an increasingly confusing world, you would think that such effortless and transparent communication would be encouraged, not regulated."

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, why is this idea of individuality and the protection of it so bad? It is perfectly natural and should be a matter of practice the world 'round. There is a chance that it could be. Enter the Wonder Twins. First off, McWilliam's CEO Kevin McLintock.

"The terminology changeover enables us to more accurately communicate the styles of our home-grown fortifieds to our customers, both locally and in export markets."

McWilliam's also thinks the name changes offer the Australian wine industry the chance to highlight our "point-of-difference" and "uniqueness".

Whoa! I think we've got a live one here. Next up is his sidekick, Stephen Strachan. He's the chief executive of the Winemakers' Federation of Australia. There is a good reason for this. He gets it.

"We don't have to sign the agreement, but by doing so, and by agreeing to drop the use of European names like sherry and port from our bottles, we do win some market access. The EU can put up technical barriers to trade based on these names; so if we have our own names, then we have something distinctly Australian."

All right, Strachan! Everything's coming up roses. Then the obligatory 'cute' factor rears its ugly head:

"The excitement and the new labels can be left up to the marketing people ... there's clearly some room for fun: one suggestion was that port just be spelt backwards - trop". Or for the vintage version, veepee?"

As bad as it sounds, this is marginally better than the previous alternative:

"He took a fairly straightforward and commonsense approach to Australian wine names. Burgundy would be renamed burgalia. Chablis, chabalia, port, portalia The list goes on."