Clever author writes eye-catching headline

Looking over the news feeds yesterday, I came across something that most definitely got my attention:

US threatens wine war with Europe

The crux of the matter evidently comes down to a matter of how wine is produced, i.e. the methods employed to acheive a desired effect. From the article:

"These include adding oak wood chips to barrels of wine to hasten the ageing process, adding water to must (the grape juice before fermentation is complete), and the use of ion extractors to reduce acidity."

Depending on who you talk to and who you believe - none, some, or all of these things are routinely practiced throughout France (and the rest of Europe for that matter), yet they just don't admit to it. I may be naïve in my thinking, but I simply do not believe this. I know there are plenty of people who swear up and down that Kermit Lynch, Neal Rosenthal, et al are merely blowing the proverbial smoke when they speak of organic growing practices, no fining or filtration, etc, etc.. I disagree.

"European Union officials, pushed by traditionalists, are so far refusing to extend a current dispensation allowing the American practices, but US officials say that if no agreement is reached they will tighten application of the Bioterrorism Act."

It was this paragraph and a statement earlier about 'an wine accord' between the two parties that got me really going. I put arguably more time than I should have trying to find a copy of said accord, to no avail. However, if you are really damn bored or find yourself awake late at night and want to get to sleep real fast, go check out the website for The Office of the United States Trade Representative. After about ten minutes of looking around this place, one question comes immediately to mind:

How the hell does anything get done!?!

What little I was able to glean from the 7-8 million .pdf files was that this is probably more a matter of taxation than anything else. I'm guessing that the French aren't really down with the methods that certain companies use and as such have set different tarrif rates on such products. In a way, this makes (albeit protectionist) sense. Instead of buying barrels made by French coopers from French Oak harvested by French LumberJacques (sorry), the American winemaker can toss a bag of sawdust in the vat and save himself a bunch of time and money. Does the extra couple of cents tacked on to each bottle of Russian River Chard make up the difference, I doubt it. But the reaction of the U.S. government seems a bit extreme.

In yet another example short-sightedness and stupidity, our boys 'up on the hill' have started a viniferous version of 'I'll just take my ball and go home', except with far greater consequences. The amount of red tape that is the Bioterrorism Act (available here in.pdf - all 657 pages of it), is simply unreal. I have commented in the past about this and it seems that little if anything has changed. That includes the use of a document created 'for safety' as a sledge hammer for getting one's way.

At the end of the day this is little more than a pissing match between the EU and the US. Unfortunately, this one is over something that I make my living off of and the less hassle it is to get the wines I want and sell here, the better. I can only hope that cooler heads will prevail.