From the Board - Callum Linklater

From the Board

CALLUM LINKLATER

WE ARE all now into the thick of another season, which is always evolving and changing. The challenge is to be open minded enough to evolve with it to meet consumer demands and expectations. As an organic contract grower I am frequently being asked about organic production, even more now than five or eight years ago, which could be a sign of how things are evolving.

I believe there are many benefits from growing organically in the vineyard, but in recent years, as demand for an organic product increases, those benefits are showing up on the bottom line too. The OANZ market report that came out earlier this year stated that organic wine exports have risen 13% since 2015 and are now worth $46 million. I would call this pleasing progress from an industry that not long ago thought of organic production as gimmicky.

The report also points out that only 4.6% of vineyard land in this country is certified organic, but on the wine lists in New Zealand’s top restaurants, organic wine makes up 30% of the choices available to diners. What I find even more pleasing about this growth is that it isn’t grower or winery led, but it’s being driven by consumers - people are voting with their wallets.

In 2018 we now have a generation of consumers (and possibly the next generation too) who are educated about where their food (and wine) comes from and how it is produced. They are also very environmentally conscious and happy to pay a few extra dollars for a product that is certified organic. There is no quick fix to meeting this demand, due to the three year conversion period to gain organic certification in the vineyard.

The organic wine sector in this country is lucky to have an organisation called Organic Winegrowers New Zealand (OWNZ), chaired by Jonathon Hamlet from Villa Maria, with Stephanie McIntyre doing some fantastic work raising the awareness of organic wine and telling a cohesive story on our behalf.

In September we had Organic Wine Week, with events held around the country celebrating New Zealand’s organic wine success to date. There were dinners held at Arbour here in

Marlborough but also at renowned restaurants such as The Grove in Auckland and Shepherd in Wellington. Huckleberry’s, Commonsense and Glengarry also got behind Organic Wine Week to help give consumers a taste of organic wine.

In 2017, OWNZ put on a conference in Blenheim specific to the organic wine sector. Its success far surpassed anyone’s expectations (delegate or organiser), and as a result there will be another one held in June 2019. There will be a range of fantastic presenters from New Zealand and abroad, so keep your ear to the ground for when you can register.

It’s really pleasing to see this kind of support behind such a small but exciting sector of the New Zealand wine industry. If you or your company aren’t already a member of OWNZ, then I would encourage you to sign up.

I don’t talk about organic viticulture much unless I am asked to, or someone is genuinely interested in having a conversation, because there are still many unfair and untrue stereotypes associated with it. But as we evolve our businesses and move forward I see organic wine production being a sensible option for growers and wine companies.

Do what is right, not what is easy.

They are also very environmentally conscious and happy to pay a few extra dollars for a product that is certified organic.

Forrest Focus

Marlborough needs to guard against complacency, says new board member

SOPHIE PREECE

BETH FORREST’S first vineyard memories are of dragging a marked white stick around an empty paddock, showing her parents, uncles, aunts and grandparents where to plant their vines. She was four years old, her brother was seven, and Forrest Estate’s apple orchard was slowly but surely transforming.

Beth recalls her little brother Sam plonked in a bin at harvest time, and her grandmother’s “best” homemade scones and jam, as a welcome break from picking grapes. “I was a complete daddy’s girl,” she says of the early days of John and Brigid Forrest’s wine dream. “If I could be on the tractor with dad, I was happy.”

Nearly 30 years on, Beth is general manager for Forrest Estate Wines, a new member of the Marlborough Winegrowers’ Board, and a determined cheerleader for the region’s wine industry. There’s energy and passion in the region, but there’s also a complacency, she warns. “We need to focus the energy and enhance it and push Marlborough forward. We need to be more than anyone expects.”

That includes finding a space in a new world of millennial consumers, amid the excitement around craft beer and boutique gin labels. Wine has a “classic”, old-school following, and there’s respect for that, she says. “But you also have to get on board and be funky and cool at the same time.” In her own range, she sees Forrest as neoclassical ballet and The Doctors’ label, with its low alcohol wines, as interpretive dance. That’s about respecting wine’s roots, but evolving to meet the desires of the market, she says.

Beth knows a bit about the new school - at 33, she fits neatly in the millennial age bracket. But she also understands traditions, having grown up in the region’s nascent wine industry, hands-on in the field. “We were brought up outdoors. School holidays were about working the vineyard. You were allowed the weekend off when school finished, then it was in on Monday at 7.30, to report to the crew.”

In her late teens she turned her back on any thoughts of a career in the wine industry, or of following her mother into medicine. Instead she chased a love of landforms and climate, and went to Otago University to study geography and biology, throwing in the double major at the request of John, in case she changed her mind about winemaking. “Some element of me was still a very good child,” she laughs.

At the end of her degree, Beth considered postgraduate study and a sojourn on Antarctic ice flows, but instead went back to her roots, and studied wine at Roseworthy. From there it was two vintages at Peregrine in Central Otago, as well as vineyard work in the summer, then a stint as assistant winemaker at Indevin in Marlborough, which she says gave her great insights into running a smooth operation. “My dad always told me, and I always pass on to wine graduates, that you need to work somewhere big to understand good processes,” she says.

There was work in Oregon, then Spain, which she loved, time in the Loire (“where I went to discover more about Savvy but fell in love with Chenin Blanc”), then in Kent making English sparkling wine, and four years working at Lawson’s Dry Hills, back in Marlborough.

Then in 2015, she decided she was ready to return home. It was an “eye opener” to work on the family estate, and to recognise the passion and care that comes with that, she says. “It has your name on it. Your childhood work is out there.” And while Beth returned for the winemaking, she has loved the challenge of being general manager for the past year, overseeing everything from grape growing and winemaking to sales, logistics and the cellar door. “It is nice to try and bring it back together as a cohesive unit for us,” she says. “I have discovered I thrive on the challenge.”