Wine royalty joined 300 wine lovers on the Hobart waterfront yesterday to talk about the growing cool climate wine industry worldwide and where it is headed. Leading UK wine expert, and wine adviser to the Queen, Jancis Robinson, yesterday welcomed delegates with a short talk about the cool climate wine regions of the world, reports The Mercury. “I am not here to pontificate about Australia’s cooler climate wines,” she told delegates. “But one of my hugest pleasures in the past few years has been trying the new wines from cooler parts of Tasmania and Victoria.”

Local winemakers are expecting a bumper harvest due to the unusually wet December and cool January weather. Hunter Valley Wine Industry Association president Andrew Margan said conditions were perfect when picking started on January 18, and although it has delayed picking at some sites, last week’s rain did not provide too much cause for concern, reports the Cessnock Advertiser. “It has been going really well with the fruit showing a lovely flavour,” Mr. Margan said.

The owners of Clare winery Skillogalee will say goodbye to their hair next week in an effort to raise $30,000 for children living with cancer. In an event inspired by the heroic battle of four-year-old nephew and grandson, Kai, Nicola Palmer will cut off her 12-year-old dreadlocks, while her father Dave Palmer will shave his head for the cause. The money raised will go towards vital machinery for kids at Brookman Ward at the Women’s and Children’s Hospital Foundation.

Wine Australia has axed its controversial export approval panel with immediate effect, replacing it with a permanent company audit regime. The changes are the result of a consultation by Wine Australia (formerly the Australian Wine & Brandy Corporation), the Government statutory authority responsible for wine export compliance and regulation, a statement released yesterday says. Exporters will no longer have to submit their wines for approval but they will be licensed and will be subject to audit, and must provide wine for comprehensive testing as required, reports Decanter.

The Western Australian wine industry says it is not too concerned about smoke taint from fires over recent days in the south-west. Some grape crops are nearing the harvesting stage slightly earlier than usual because of warm weather accelerating the ripening process. It is a high risk time for smoke taint of grapes. Wine Industry Association of Western Australia general manager Aymee Mastaglia says windy weather would have been a saving grace for grape crops, reports ABC News.

Carrington Place owner/chef Scott Webster loves to open doors for young people in the food and beverage industry. To do it in the name of his good mate, winemaker Trevor Drayton, is the icing on the cake. The inaugural Trevor Drayton Food and Beverage Scholarship is open to food or beverage employees in the Hunter Region who have been working in the industry for five years or less. The winner will have the opportunity to work with internationally acclaimed chefs and winemakers and undertake work experience at Webster’s Osia Restaurant, in Singapore, reports the Newcastle Herald.

The need to continually promote the area as a premiere tourist destination has meant Barossa Tourism has a new team leader. The role of Regional Tourism Manager of the Barossa has been filled by former Herald journalist and writer for Wine Business Magazine Nathan Gogoll, who began work on Monday. Mr Gogoll explained the Regional Development Australia Barossa administered the role, while Tourism Barossa led the initiative, reports the Barossa Herald.

Whatever the price of a bottle of wine and the degree to which this influences the buyer, the label still plays an extraordinarily important role in its purchase. The label also provides the buyer with the other information that he or she wants and needs to know about the wine. Why the need, then, for a second or back label on the reverse side of the bottle? It is there to provide a warning to people who are allergic to certain foods, or are vegans and do not eat these foods, that traces could be present in the wine. The puzzling bit is how you get traces of fish, dairy products or eggs, the usual culprits, in wine, writes Warren Barton in The Southland Times.

Climate, soil and geography have long been recognised playing an important role in shaping the character of a region’s wines and whose interplay is at the heart of the French concept of terroir. However, a breakthrough by New Zealand scientists now suggests that an area’s yeasts could play their part in regional differences as well, with the discovery that communities and strains of wine yeasts vary from region to region. In the light of these findings, winemakers wanting to make wines most expressive of a specific place might want to dispense with generic yeasts from a packet and let nature take control of their ferments, writes Jo Burzynsca in The New Zealand Herald.

A high-powered Swiss couple are the new owners of Kina Beach Vineyard and have plans to expand its profile and production. Achim Bauer, a partner in accountancy giant PriceWaterhouseCoopers in London, and Karin Schoch, a human resources manager in Zurich, paid just over $2 million for the six-hectare vineyard and accommodation business started by Dave Birt and Pam Robert in 1997, reports the Nelson Mail.