MERBEIN winemaker Chalmers Wines has won a national award for its 2014 Montevecchio¬ Moscato at the Australian Inland Wine Show at Swan Hill. The award-winning wine produced from an imported Italian grape variety, Moscato Giallo, was made at the Chalmers family’s Heathcote vineyard. Kim and Tennille Chalmers said they were thrilled to have won the award in the National Moscato Challenge section of the wine show – held earlier this month – which attracted 50 entrants.

Treasury Wine Estates is back on song. In the past year Treasury Wine chief executive Mike Clarke has significantly cut costs, increased earnings, and now he is boldly making sizeable acquisitions, including the $754 million purchase of Diageo’s wine business. The deal is expected to double revenue from US luxury wine sales and supercharge its growth in the world’s biggest economy.

It’s technology that would make Q proud: glue that can store microscopic information. Like a scene out of a Bond movie or Minority Report, this glue – and other fluids mixed with paint or applied to surfaces – acts as a tiny gel screen that can be scanned to retrieve the product’s information and history to prove its authenticity. The process, developed by Australia’s CSIRO, is now being applied to everything from the paint on vehicles to zoo animals.

Penfolds celebrated the new vintage release of The Penfolds Collection 2015, led by the flagship 2011Grange, at a gala event held in Shanghai a short time ago. The event, hosted by Penfolds Chief Winemaker Peter Gago, was attended by more than 300 international guests and featured the global premier of ‘The Story of Grange’, a short film showcasing the story of Grange and its creator, Max Schubert. Gago said the event was a celebration in every sense of the word.

The value of Australian wine exports has seen a seven year spike in the past 12 months, rising eight per cent to $1.96 billion, according to a report released by Wine Australia today. Export Report September 2015 signals the need for improvement in profitability for Australian wine, with the rate of value growth currently outpacing volume which increased five per cent to 734 million litres. Andreas Clark, Wine Australia’s Chief Executive Officer, said the export results are “unambiguously good news” for the grape and wine community.

Some banks are seeing a growing breed of vineyard buyer: San Francisco or Silicon Valley executives or entrepreneurs wanting to wine and dine friends with their private-label wine. In response to increasing demand from these and other buyers, Exchange Bank earlier this year formalized a vineyard-loan program and now offers 10- and 15-year, fixed-rate loans, says Steve Herron, manager of the commercial banking group for the Santa Rosa, Calif.-based bank.

Pernod Ricard has announced a number of key new appointments. In Asia, Xavier Beysecker has been appointed vice president, digital for Pernod Ricard Asia. Digital is a key area of focus for the group as it moves from a brand-focused approach to a consumer-centric strategy under the leadership of new chairman and chief executive Alexandre Ricard.

ZURICH (Reuters) – Bayer expects to pay wine growers compensation starting early next year after vineyards in Austria, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg and Switzerland reported 2015 crop damage possibly linked to one of the company’s fungicides. European grape growers reported deformed leaves and lower yields after using Moon Privilege – called Luna Privilege in some markets – from the German company’s Crop Science unit.

Ongoing wine research by Dr Wendy Parr of Lincoln University indicates that while minerality is not a figment of tasters’ sensorial imagination, the source of the perception remains a mystery, and the description should be used with caution in formal wine tasting and judging situations. ‘Minerality’ is used by wine professionals to describe the character of certain wines, with vague references made to wet stones, crushed rock and soil.

A survey into the growth of the Marlborough wine industry and its impact on the labour market will be a “guiding document” going forward, an industry expert says. Wine Marlborough general manager Marcus Pickens said more than 60 grapegrowers, wine companies and labour contractors would be interviewed as part of the research. The survey, which started on Monday, was the most comprehensive study into the future impact of the industry to date, Pickens said.