Focus on France Ian Sparks reports from Paris

EURO-REPORT

FOCUS ON... France

Ian Sparks reports from Paris on more woes for France’s winegrowers.

French wine producers are in uproar over a government plan to double the size of health warnings on bottles urging women not to drink alcohol when pregnant.

The current warning shows a 5mm high sillouette of a pregnant woman holding a wine glass, with a diagonal ‘stop sign’ line through it. But the health ministry now plans to increase the size of the logo to 1cm high, in response to the latest figures from the National Institute for Health and Medical Research, which reveal that a quarter of French women continue to drink alcohol when pregnant.

The warnings were first introduced ten years ago after several mothers of babies diagnosed with foetal alcohol syndrome sued the government for failing to alert them to the dangers.

But Herve Grandeau, of the Bordeaux Wine Producers’ Federation, described the measure as ‘half-baked’ and accused the government of merely trying to ‘salve the conscience of the authorities’.

He said: “There has been no study of alcohol consumption by pregnant women since the warning came in. We don’t know if it works. Today it’s a larger warning, tomorrow they’ll want more colours and soon wine labels will be drowned in health warnings.”

And Bernard Farges, who represents another Bordeaux winegrowers’ association, added: “This leads us to fear that the government will eventually impose bottles similar to plain cigarette packets, which have been introduced in France to combat smoking.”

But experts say around 8000 babies are born each year in France with mental or physical health problems caused by their mothers’ consumption of alcohol, and the medical community is increasingly concerned about the risks.

Leading paediatrician Dr Denis Lamblin said: “You can’t just blame the mothers. It’s society as a whole and drinks manufacturers whose advertising increasingly targets woman of childbearing age.

“The current warning is not visible enough, and producers do everything to camouflage it. Why are there photos of malformed foetuses on cigarette packets when the consequences of smoking during pregnancy are less dramatic than those of alcohol?

“There is one baby with alcohol-related problems born every hour in France. As well as causing miscarriages, alcohol has been linked with more than 400 medical disorders in children.”

The new health warnings are the latest gripe of winemakers, who claim they are already suffering from the worst harvest in 30 years last year, and competition from ‘cheap’ foreign imports.

Last month, producers staged a day of action in south west France, emptying at least one tanker of Spanish wine and blocking a depot used by the wine subsidiary of Carrefour supermarket. Sixty winegrowers also blocked the entrance to Prodis, the wine subsidiary of the Carrefour supermarket group, near a site in Nómes known to be used for producing bag-in-box wines.

Other protesters went to the motorway toll of Gallargues-le-Monteux, 15 miles away, to find lorries containing Spanish wine.

Anaôs Amalric, co-president of Jeunes Agriculteurs du Gard, said: “These Spanish imports prevent us from selling our French products. Our tanks are full, prices are falling and wine merchants are asking us to lower prices. This is unacceptable.”

Last year, several wine industry leaders in Languedoc sounded the alarm over cheap Spanish imports. Some producers also hijacked lorries and attacked depots, but local unions officially condemned the violence.

Critics have said that French winemakers must accept competition from other EU member states.

But some Languedoc winemakers claim that fewer taxes in Spain make competition unfair.

“Our tanks are full, prices are falling and wine merchants are asking us to lower prices.”

Tourism picks up

Meanwhile, the French tourism industry is finally celebrating the return of visitors after two of the worst years in the industry’s history after a spate of terrorist attacks.

During the last three months of 2016, the amount of overnight stays showed an increase of 3.9 per cent compared to the last quarter of 2015, after two consecutive quarters of decline, according to the Institute of Statistics.

This strong rebound is more than offsetting the net decline of minus 1.8 per cent recorded a year earlier, and was directly attributed to terrorism.

The rebound comes after the French government vowed to plough €10 million into boosting its tourism industry, in response to street protests by hoteliers and other hospitality industry owners at global losses of around €750 million over two years.

The money is being spent on publicity campaigns promoting France around the world, boasting about the country’s museums, cafes, beaches and cultural attractions.

Tourism is a €170 billion industry in France, with 90 billion of that accounting for cafes, restaurants and hotels alone. With 2 million people working in the tourism services sector, a decrease in tourism arrivals can have a ripple effect throughout the entire economy.

Steve Born, head of marketing for the US-based tour group Globus, said: “We have seen that bookings for 2017 are now back on a par with the level before the 2015 attacks. France has it all. For those that are looking to visit Europe, it’s such an iconic experience and must-see destination.” n