BCWI ReleaseMember Release

Brix: A measure of sugar in grapes: one degree Brix equals 10 grams of sugar per litre. Mature grapes are typically 21 to 25 Brix, equating to 11 to 13 percent alchohol after fermentation.*

VQA: VQA=100% BC - All British Columbia wines bearing the VQA symbol must be made from 100% BC grown grapes. The wines are screened by a professional tasting panel and wines found faulty cannot be sold as VQA wines.

Tannin: A compound in the skin and seeds of grapes that is essential in providing substance and backbone to red wines.*

Viticulture: Grapes for Icewine are harvested at -8° Celsius or lower, and often by moonlight.

Geology: Mt. Boucherie (near Kelowna), home to a number of wineries, is an extinct volcano.

*Schreiner, John - British Columbia Wine Country, Whitecap Books Ltd., 2003

 
 
  July 20, 2007

New standards and regulations for BC’s wine industry

Kelowna, BC July 20, 2007 – New standards and regulations for BC’s wine industry have been passed into law by an order in council dated July 18, 2007. The BC Wine Authority (BCWA) is the new body that will oversee these new standards called ‘Wines of Marked Quality Regulation’. The BCWA will be charged with implementing the newly enacted regulations for BC’s wine industry and recommending changes to the regulations in the future.

The previous legislation governing the wine industry was the Wine Act, which put into law the VQA standard, which the BC Wine Institute has overseen since 1990. “The BC Wine Institute and its winery-members are extremely proud of how the VQA program evolved and believe that the VQA standards have driven the positive, quality-directed growth of our industry,” states Scott Fraser, Chair of the BC Wine Institute.

The BC Wine Institute has strongly supported the creation of the Wine Authority, and has worked cooperatively with the Ministry of Agriculture and Lands for a number of years to get the Authority up and running. “We believe that moving standards into a separate organization, independent of wineries themselves, that has enforcement powers, will strengthen even more the credibility of the standards and overall serve consumers’ interests,” Fraser adds.

“We believe that in order for BC’s wine industry to flourish in the future, all wineries should be subject to the same regulations, and that the body governing those regulations should have the power to enforce the regulations,” Fraser states. The BCWA brings all wineries under a single set of regulations and a single body charged with enforcing those regulations. All wineries will have to register and meet a core set of standards regarding winemaking and labelling. The mandatory level of ‘Wines of Marked Quality’ for all wineries does not include VQA certification as the VQA program continues to be optional.

The BC Wine Institute will continue, as it has since 2006, as a voluntary trade association charged with the advocacy, communications and marketing of BC’s VQA wines. BCWI membership represents almost 90% of BC’s wine production. BCWI membership represents small, medium and large wineries in all viticultural regions of the province.

Based in Kelowna, the BCWI promotes the Wines of British Columbia (BC VQA) and the Wine Regions of British Columbia brands.


For further information:
Lindsay Anders, Communications Manager
tel (250) 762-9744 ext. 103 toll-free 1-800-661-2294
landers@winebc.com www.winebc.com

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