News & Events
Starting November 2, 2020, earth-friendly vineyards and wineries will take stock of their sustainability efforts and apply for certification, with SWBC Certified wine hitting the shelves as early as spring 2021.
SWBC Certified represents the next generation of global certification standards, adapted to the BC winegrowing industry. The goal is to position BC wineries and growers as sustainability leaders worldwide. Ultimately, success will depend on the cooperative efforts of wineries, grape growers and industry stakeholders working individually and together.
IPM is an integral part of smart agriculture. It is multi-faceted approach that emphasizes long-term prevention of pests (ie. weeds, insects/mites, diseases) or their damage. Relying on diligent pest monitoring, IPM helps growers decide if and how management is needed. When required, the aim is to use economically viable methods with the least possible ecological risk and hazard to people.
“We’ve made some good strides towards our goal of reducing our per case energy consumption by 25% by 2025. We know we’ve still got a long way to go, but we just keep chipping away at it. Sustainability seems to be something that all of our departments are quick to band together on, I think it’s something people feel good about. Besides the obvious environmental benefits, we’ve also been saving a few thousand dollars a year in energy costs by making some pretty simple changes.”
Interested in learning more about SWBC Certified? Join us for an online information session about the program essentials.
Our recent study of 12 wine-growing regions around the world concluded that BC can expect the following economic benefits from sustainability certification:
Given the rapidly changing conditions, the Sustainable Winegrowing BC Certification launch, originally scheduled for April 1, will be put on hold until the fall of 2020. However, on April 1st, SWBC will be offering their new self-assessment tool in the ‘free resources’ section of their web-site, sustainablewinegrowingbc.ca.
Up on a hill between the Muscat vines at Lastella winery, three head-high rows of woodchips are baking away in the sun. Vineyard manager Jody Subotin probes the end of a pile with a two foot long temperature gauge, checking on the compost pile’s progress. At the end of one row, a large pile of grape skins and stems is steaming. The enormous compost pile is the winery’s natural fertilizer experiment for 10 of their 70 acres of vines.
After years of learning and planning, this summer the team at Sustainable Winegrowing BC (SWBC) updated their on-line self-assessment to sustainability standards for vineyard and winery certification. The outcomes based standards are available on the SWBC web-site for review and comment until the end of the year. The SWBC directors were excited to see how the new guidelines would play out in real wine businesses, and principals from Tightrope, Red Rooster, Quails’ Gate and Le Vieux Pin volunteered to be pilot participants for the anticipated sustainability certification program.
This summer the BC Wine Grape Council hosted the busy Enology & Viticulture Conference and Trade Show. Sustainability was the hot topic, and the wine world weighed in with insights and innovations over two solid days of learning and networking.