What to do with labelling

Published: 18 September, 2008

You could take it as a sign of the importance of the wine market in the UK that Channel 4 should devote an hour-long programme to industry practices.

You could take it as a sign of the importance of the wine market in the UK that Channel 4 should devote an hour-long programme to industry practices.

But judging by the feedback I've received from some in the industry to this week's Dispatches, that interest might be described less cordially and with the odd expletive added to the mix.

Yet the subject of the programme - the issue of labelling and the ingredients used during the winemaking process - raises questions we need to address.

The WSTA is not opposed in principle to ingredient-labelling for wine; a list of permissible ingredients is, after all, publicly available.

But, as we've been saying to government officials here and in Europe, the fact is that delivering precise labelling in 27 languages for a product that by its nature varies and may require different ingredients during the winemaking process would be hugely costly.

We estimate that cost to be €1 billion over three years, almost certainly enough certainly deter some producers from selling to smaller markets.

Result: consumers pay more and/or lose choice.

Government officials in the UK agree and, with the support of the EU agricultural division, we're seeking a five-year exemption from general labelling legislation now being negotiated in Brussels.

But ordinary consumers have a different view. They wonder how it can be that packets of food sold everywhere from Nantes to Newcastle can have a full list of ingredients on the back and yet we in the wine business can't conjure a bottle label doing the same thing.

We need to find a solution. Could it be a set of graphics depicting content categories? Could it be a referral to a consumer website? I don't know the answer.

What I do know is that the trend points to providing more information for the consumer, not less. That's why we are also urging the EU Commission to consider ways in which this sort of information can be communicated multilingually in a way that won't harm the principle of consumer choice at the heart of the single market.

Jeremy Beadles is chief executive of the Wine and Spirit Trade Association