Italy’s Winemakers, and Grapes, Are Adapting to Climate Change
Heat and drought are a challenge for Italy’s wine industry, the current world leader in production, but it is proving remarkably resilient.
Candles warding off frost at the Vini Franchetti Vineyards, Tuscany.
Photograph courtesy Vini Franchetti Vineyards.
It has been another unnerving year in the vineyards of Italy, the current world leader in wine production. The River Po has struggled to remain wet. A glacier collapsed in the Dolomites. The Italian government declared last summer that drought had produced a state of emergency in five northern regions, citing climate change as a culprit. In 2021, even as exports hit a record $7 billion, overall production was down about 9%.
Still, Filippo Mazzei, who produces wines at Castello di Fonterutoli in Tuscany, is not especially worried. The wine business is highly vulnerable to even subtle changes in climate. But it’s also a repository of expertise, passion and innovation. If there is a way to blunt the havoc that climate change threatens to wreak on their vineyards, vintners will probably figure it out.