Taps de Finca: devoted to local cork

Cork oak trees ready. Peelers focused. Axes sharpened. Cork stripping begins. Chop... first vertical blows to the bark... chop... the first turns with the axe to lift the bark, the part of the tree that will have to regenerate the cork... chop... the first horizontal marks to determine the height of the strip or piece... chop... a few more cuts... chop... hands and axes in synch so, with a final split, the cork will forever leave the tree it once covered.

Cork extraction is almost poetic. It’s a traditional craft that requires skill and experience not to damage the oak while also being highly respectful of the tree’s growth cycle. In fact, a cork tree is first stripped when it is around 20 years old, and it takes about 12 to 14 more years before the cork can be harvested the second time. By the third stripping, more than a decade later, the cork is not sufficiently uniform and no longer has the optimal thickness to make stoppers. The owners of farms grouped together in the Association of Forest Managers of Les Gavarres and the Forest Consortium of Catalonia are well aware of this. Companies in the Girona region dedicated to the cork stopper industry also know this, along with winemakers, who have seen cork stoppers mixed alongside plastic and screw top stoppers on tabletops in recent years.

Commitment to local cork

In order to highlight the value of native cork, support its recovery, and contribute to the management of the surrounding area, the Regulatory Council of the DO Empordà and the Catalan Cork Institute created the Taps de Finca brand five years ago to distinguish wines from the region that use cork stoppers made from farms in the local area. Their objectives are well grounded as nearly 40% of Catalonia’s cork oak trees are found in the Empordà according to official data. Here, cork oak trees have been growing alongside vineyards for time immemorial. In fact, the cork stopper industry in the Iberian peninsula was first launched here: the first manufacturing companies were documented in the Alt Empordà around the end of the 18th century.

The ecological value of cork

Joining the Taps de Finca brand means embracing a smaller ecological footprint since the cork is extracted and the stoppers are manufactured within the same region. It also involves strengthening cork oak forest management and helps reduce the risk of dangerous fires. Moreover, the growth in production by Taps de Finca involves new cork oak forest production in Catalonia with all the ecological, environmental, social, and emotional values that it entails

So many reflections awoken by such a small object. Buying a bottle of wine won’t be the same from now on as we’ll almost certainly look for the Taps de Finca de la DO Empordà logo on the labels. When you turn your corkscrew, close your eyes, listen to the squeak of the cork as it loosens from the bottle, and recall the process involved in stripping the bark from the oak tree. Our first toast will be to the cork as a token of gratitude for its long journey into our hands. //