Winemakers report billions in damages

Several frosty nights this week destroyed much of this year’s grape crop. The frost mainly affected wine-growing areas in Bohemia, in Moravia most grapes survived. However, some Czech wineries lost their entire harvest.

“On Tuesday morning, it was -6 degrees in the vineyard. It was already cold a few nights before, but the night from Tuesday to Wednesday was the worst,” describes Kateřina Kreisinger from the Czech winery Chrámce. Her company grows mainly blue varieties on approximately 70 hectares of vineyards located on the western edge of the Český středohoří between Most and Lovosice.

“We basically lost one hundred percent of the harvest. We estimate the damage at 10 million crowns,” says Kreisinger. “We’ll see if anything survived, but we reckon we won’t make any wine this year,” he adds, adding that the white wine from last year will sell out soon, but the stock of red should last the whole season.

“I don’t know what we will do with the employees. There are 12 of them working in the vineyards and there will be no work for them. But I can’t tell them not to go to work for a month now,” he thinks.

Bettina Lobkowicz Winery in Mělník was similarly affected. “We lost 99 to 100 percent of the grapes,” says the head of the winery, Jonáš Grepl. His company farms 50 hectares of vineyards and lost about 200,000 bottles of wine this year, the damage will be in the millions.

The wine-growing regions in Moravia were not affected by such low temperatures, in recent nights they dropped to the level of -2 to -3 degrees, so the damage is less. The Union of Winemakers estimates that essentially the entire crop has frozen in Bohemia, about a fifth in Moravia.

“On some routes we lost 10 percent, somewhere half, somewhere a third,” says Filip Mlýnek from the winery of the same name in Dolní Dunajovice near Mikulov. “In total, I would estimate it to be about a third,” he adds.

Jindřich Kadrnka from Březí in Mikulovsk also lost a third of his harvest. “Somewhere it burned the whole vineyard, somewhere only the part that lies on the hill. It also depends on the varieties. Frost has no logic,” says Kadrnka. He fears not only financial damage, but also the loss of market positions. “The restaurants and wine shops we deliver to will replace us with another wine,” he assumes. “We will try to buy high-quality grapes so that the shortfall in production is as small as possible,” he claims.

The frost also deprived the large Chateau Valtice winery of a large part of its grapes. “The frost avoided us for a long time, but now it has hit us noticeably and we are still counting the damage. In some places, up to 90% of the vineyards are frozen. The total damage to the crop will be up to 40 percent,” says David Šťastný, director of Chateau Valtice – Vinné sklepy Valtice.

Even protection in the form of paraffin candles and smoke did not help the winegrowers against the frost. “These measures will raise the temperature by a maximum of two degrees. When it’s six below zero, it doesn’t make sense,” explains Kateřina Kreisinger from the Chramec winery in northern Bohemia.

The winegrowers’ union is still calculating the damages, but according to the head of the union, Martin Chlad, they will be high.

“We estimate that they will exceed one billion crowns,” said Chlad SZ Byznys. The Minister of Agriculture, Marek Výborný, announced on Thursday that the fruit growers, who also calculated the damage caused by the frost at one billion, can count on extraordinary support in the amount of 70 to 100 million crowns.

However, this support does not apply to winemakers. “The announced program concerns fruit growers. The minister is in contact with winegrowers’ representatives and will discuss possible support with the Winegrowers’ Association next week,” says Vojtěch Bílý, spokesman for the Ministry of Agriculture.

According to Chlad, this year’s frosts have once again shown how fragile the wine industry is. “An excise tax on still wine would make our situation even worse. We will unequivocally demand an end to the consideration of the introduction of this tax,” says the president of the Winemakers’ Union resolutely. “The scaremongering of excise taxes and the spread of alarmist news alone cause millions of dollars in damage,” adds David Šťastný from Chateau Valtice.