Wines

Wines: Forward to Winemaking – to Grapes – to Countries

Image source: londonwinecompetition.com

Wines: Grapes

I decided to take a look at wine – wine drinking being one of my favourite things – and I believed that I should learn more about the subject.

Thence, the research I did led me to conclude that there are over 80 species and 10,000 varieties of wine grape in the world, the top thirteen grape varieties are responsible for one-third of all of today’s grapevines, and that the top thirty-three grapes are responsible for 50% of all wine production.

Next, I took a look at the most prominent grapes.

Image source: winefolly.com/grapes

In fact, consumption of wine worldwide is 47% red, 43% white, 9% rosé, 1% other (source: OIV)

Next, the top thirteen grapes worldwide were established as –

reds: Cabernet Franc – Cabernet Sauvignon – Malbec – Merlot

– Pinot noir – Syrah/Shiraz;

whites: Chardonnay – Gewürztraminer – Muscat – Pinot blanc – Pinot gris

– Riesling – Sauvignon blanc

Subsequently, the next twenty-five grapes of significance were established as –

reds: Barbera – Carignan – Gamay – Grenache – Mourvèdre – Petit Verdot –

Sangiovese – Tannat – Tempranillo – Touriga Nacional – Zweigelt

whites: Albariño – Aligoté – Arinto – Chenin blanc – Malvasia –

Müller-Thurgau – Muscat-Ottonel – Sémillon – Tămâioasă Românească –

Traminer – Ugni-blanc – Viognier – Welschriesling

and: Cava

Image source: perfection.com.au

Countries

Then, I looked at the top wine-producing countries, to find that the big five producers

– France – Italy – Spain – USA – Chile –

Thus, I established that 42% of world vineyards, produce 64% of world wine – but just 41% of wine consumption (OIV 2022).

Image source: winefolly.com/lifestyle/top-wine-regions-of-the-world/

Next, the ten largest wine-producing countries (by volume) were defined as:

– Argentina – Australia – China – Germany – India

– New Zealand – Portugal – Romania – South Africa – Turkey

Therefore, together with the big five, are responsible for 75% of vineyards, 88% of wine production, and 64% of wine consumption (OIV 2022).

Image source: countryliving.com/food-drinks

Wines: People and alcohol

Let’s give this some perspective:

Today, the world’s population is currently around eight billion people,, However, we need to subtract the 25% who are under 15, then discount the 45% of adults, who say they are life-time alcoholic abstainers for religious or other reasons.

Thus, the available market to just 3.3 billion people. My research suggests that there are less than eight litres of wine produced for each individual per year.

Nevertheless, seven-times as much beer is consumed worldwide as wine – one-hundred-and eighty-five billion litres of beer to twenty-six billion litres of wine. Therefore, each alcohol-drinking adult has fifty-seven litres of beer produced for them each year (cf. eight litres of wine).

Then, here is Wikipedia’s look at population, back in 2017. Two points to stress – India has overtaken China, but tiny UK still appears within the greyed-out ‘other’.