French Wine

France is one of the oldest wine manufacturing countries of Europe. It manufactures most of the wine according to value in the world. Bourgogne wine, Bordeaux wine and Champagne are some of the significant agricultural products.

The Appellation System

A number of regulations were passed to direct the worth of French wine in the year 1935. They launched the Appellation system which is managed by a strong supervision board. Consequently, France contains the oldest appellation structures for wine in the world and strict rules were followed for the production of wine and winemaking.

Other structures of Europe were also developed on it. The movement of France also carries on with further development of European Union. The laws of French classified wine into 4 groups such as 2 falls under the European Union’s Quality Wine Produced in a Specific Region group and another 2 falls under the European Union’s Table Wine group. The groups are as follows:-

Quality Wine Produced in a Specific Region

• Appellation d’Origine Controlee – Wine from a specific region following many restrictions which involves winemaking processes and grape types.
• Vin Delimite de Qualite Superieure – It is less harsh as compared to above group and is not generally used.

Table Wine

• Vin de Pays – Continues with it a particular area within France
• Vin de Table – Continues with it only the designation and producer that is from France

Terroir

Terroir means the exclusive grouping of natural features which are connected with any specific vineyard. These features involve altitude, soil, slope of terrain or hill, microclimate such as (humidity, variations, typical rain, temperature and winds), underlying rock and orientation towards the sun. Two vineyards cannot be considered in the similar region and contain the accurate similar terroir.

Wine Regions of France

• Bergerac
• Jura
• Alsace
• Beaujolais
• Bourgogne which involves Maconnais and Chablis
• Rhone Valley involving Crozes-Hermitage AOC and Cotes du Rhone
• Roussillon
• Loire Valley involving Vouvray, Muscadet and Sancerre
• Languedoc wine region involving Minervois, Coteaux du Languedoc and Corbieres
• Bordeaux which involves Graves , Medoc and Sauternes

Trends

The largest purchaser of varieties of wine is France . But the consumption of wine has been falling in this country from about forty years. The producers of wine in France depend on the foreign markets.

But the consumption of wine is also falling in other countries also such as Spain , Italy and Portugal . French laws put restrictions on the practice of French wines. The policies of French have produced easy rules for the group of Vin de pays.

Trivia

• There are about 450 different wine appellations in France .
• The use of dried blood of the cow to elucidate wine is no longer allowed.
• Only 15 percent of all French wines enjoy the benefits of marketing of certain categories of wine.