An exceptionally early vintage is creating production difficulties for wineries and added pressure for grapegrowers in South Australia. On average, this year’s vintage was about a month earlier than normal due to a combination of local seasonal factors and climate change, SA’s Winegrape Council executive officer Peter Hackworth said. “What it’s meant is a lot of the varieties that normally would ripen distinctively apart have tended to come in at the same time,” Hackworth said.

Entries are open for the 2012 New World Wine Awards. In addition to the distinction of an award that recognises quality on the same international scale as all other wine competitions, winning winemakers are guaranteed national distribution and extensive brand exposure, driving sustained sales. In 2011, winners saw wine disappear off shelves in record time. Over 250,000 bottles of the 50 top wines, with a retail value in excess of $3.3m, were sold throughout New World supermarkets in the first six weeks of the award results being announced, reports Voxy News Engine.

A smaller harvest means consumers should expect to pay more for wine this year, say Nelson winemakers. But the quality of the local vintage should be among the best in the country after superb autumn weather rescued what was shaping up to be a difficult season. With just a few late red varieties and some riesling still to pick this week, the Nelson harvest is expected to be down 20 per cent on last year to under 6000 tonnes after downpours in December badly affected the flowering of some varieties, reports the Nelson Mail.

One of the challenges Marlborough winemakers have each vintage is to produce quality wines with the same quintessential flavours, regardless of the seasonal variations. Plant and Food Research scientists based at the Marlborough Wine Research Centre in Blenheim, focus on viticultural and winemaking variations to help the wine industry deliver those familiar flavour compositions consumers have come to expect, reports the Marlborough Express.

Concerns about the status of Australia’s grapevine germplasm collection have been resurrected, with several industry stakeholders calling for a national discussion and strategy reports Grapegrower & Winemaker. Viticulturists are calling on the wine sector’s statutory and advocacy associations to find a way to fund a national clonal collection so Australia’s valued clones can maintain a high level of protection, traceability and accessibility.

Winemakers are raising their glasses to the federal budget, saying it will help them restructure and refocus on export opportunities in Asia. The federal budget released on Tuesday includes $2.1 million over two years for the Wine Australia Corporation to market the industry, and funding boosts for the Australian Bureau of Statistics and the Department of Agriculture research bureau ABARES for studies. The government will also continue to match research and development funding for the wine sector dollar for dollar, reports AAP.

Would sparkling wine be as popular without the pop? That was the question on many minds at the launch of the world’s first high-pressure sparkling wine under screw cap in Sydney May 8. With a look and feel much like a traditional aluminum screw cap, the new heavy-duty Viiva closure has been engineered for high-pressure sparkling wines. Until now, screw caps have been deemed reliable only for very lightly carbonated sparkling wines, writes Tyson Stelzer in Wine Spectator.

De Bortoli Wines has unveiled new Australian developed screw cap technology for sparkling wine that it reckons will receive a strong reception from the hospitality industry. The wine company has worked with two Australian packaging innovators in the development of the new sparkling wine screw cap that it’s initially rolling out on two of its sparkling wine brands, its retail targeted Trevi range and on premise Willowglen Sparkling Brut, reports Hospitality Magazine.

De Bortoli Wines has unveiled new Australian developed screw cap technology for sparkling wine that it reckons will receive a strong reception from the hospitality industry. The wine company has worked with two Australian packaging innovators in the development of the new sparkling wine screw cap that it’s initially rolling out on two of its sparkling wine brands, its retail targeted Trevi range and on premise Willowglen Sparkling Brut, reports Hospitality Magazine.

The Federal Budget will close a loophole which saw some wine producers claiming a producer rebate twice. Closing the loophole is estimated to save $10 million a year for four years, and will apply from July. Under the previous rules, a wine producer might claim the wine equalisation tax rebate then sell the wine to another producer. That producer would then mix the wine with another batch, and claim the rebate again on the entire volume. The Government says the measure “will protect the integrity of the rebate, and address unintended policy outcomes arising where wine is subject to blending and further manufacture”, reports ABC Rural.