2024-12-17 10:00:00
Cognac’s change of direction is brutal. The prestigious vineyard is preparing to uproot its vines in 2025. The project, described as “vineyard adaptation plan”it was validated by the interprofessional association on Friday 13 December. A radical about-face despite having undertaken a strategy of forced expansion in recent years. The sharp slowdown in sales growth, in China as in the United States, after the shock of the Covid-19 crisis, then that of inflation, combined with Beijing’s desire to tax imports from January, has taken away the precious Charentaise eau- de-vie on the wrong foot.
Symbol of the cold affecting this prestigious denomination, the National Interprofessional Office of Cognac (BNIC) decided, at the end of November, to abandon the project to build a new headquarters, designed by Jean-Michel Wilmotte, in Cognac (Charente). But for winemakers the potion risks being even more bitter. Especially because the effects of the slowdown have been felt for two years already. «In 2022 the yield set by the inter-profession on the basis of the needs expressed by traders was 14.7 hectoliters of pure alcohol per hectare. It increased to 10.5 hectoliters in 2023, then to 8.64 hectoliters in 2024. This is a 40% reduction in two years”explains Matthieu Augier, winemaker from Mainxe (Charente).
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