When you imagine the grape harvest, what do you see?
Green vines jewelled with clusters of plump golden grapes, planted in long rows bordered with grasses and wildflowers? Perhaps the scene is lit by warm rays of sunshine; a few men and women might be laughing and talking as they fill wicker baskets with ripe fruit, about to pause for lunch at a table covered with a red and white cloth laid with baguettes, cheese, a few chilled bottles of rosé…
Drinkers and the wine trade “have long seen harvest time as a cross between a harvest fête and a garden party”, says Anne Jones, sustainability consultant at Limestone and Jones. Wine is sold on storytelling, often involving pastoral scenes like the one I’ve painted above. Ten years ago, talk of diverse ecosystems and biodynamics might have been considered woo-woo, but greater awareness of environmental sustainability has seen producers and wine writers leaning into descriptions of cover crops, healthy soils, and “vineyard helpers” in the form of ducks and sheep. Promoting sustainable winemaking is important – existentially so – but the stories we’re telling ourselves and others are missing a crucial chapter: the human cost of wine production.
According to Jones, “we need to move away from thinking about wine as just bucolic: we need to start talking about carbon capture and labour and all the dirty industrial stuff.” With an increasing number of viticulture-related human rights abuses being reported in the media, we simply cannot ignore these “dirty” topics any longer, and The Wine Society is leading by example.
On a grey Thursday in late May, they hosted a panel discussion chaired by the Sustainable Wine Roundtable’s (SWT) Dr Peter Stanbury, including 12 representatives from wineries, retailers, labour providers, NGOs, issue specialists, distributors, and certification schemes. Stanbury described the purpose of the event in humble terms: “We don’t have all the answers – we don’t, in fact, have many answers at all. We are here to at least start talking about it”.
This need to “at least start talking” was echoed around the panel. According to Jantine Werdmuller von Elgg, co-CEO of Stronger Together: change “starts with awareness: only when we start talking about this topic as something that is happening – and recognise that it is happening to all of us – can we start looking at what these challenges actually look like.”
And it really does affect all of us. Quoting UK minister Jess Phillips, Werdmuller von Elgg emphasised that “modern slavery is so prevalent that if businesses are not identifying risks, they are probably not looking hard enough”: all wine businesses, from big multi-nationals to small growers – even self-employed writers like me – are implicated in one way or another.
The problem, according to Jones, is that nobody wants to be the person responsible for social responsibility. She explained that Wine GB is working towards adding a social element to their sustainable certification scheme, but winery employees “feel very concerned about being the person responsible […] they know who will fill in the boxes on environmental standards, but who fills them in on the social side? It is a very lonely place to be.”
Allan Sichel, president of the Bordeaux industrial body CIVIB, shared that producers are feeling “overwhelmed”. Drinkers are starting to expect environmental certifications, which come with a whole host of challenges and risks, and social responsibility brings additional legal complexities that can be daunting for small growers – an issue exacerbated by a general reluctance towards talking openly about the subject. “Labour laws in France are so strict we thought we were well protected” Sichel said, explaining that many producers in Bordeaux had been unaware of their obligations to temporary workers before reports of vineyard worker exploitation came to light. “If you work with a labour supplier […] you still have to ensure legal wages, fair treatment, access to welfare and medical care – we need to raise awareness about these obligations.”
A veil of silence seems to hang over the issue of social responsibility, which has left the burden of speaking out to whistle-blowers and the press – a backdoor approach that has nevertheless yielded positive results. Sichel shared that, in Bordeaux, media reporting inspired the state, producers, and labour providers to come together for the first time to share the issues they were facing – a productive dialogue that ultimately resulted in them co-authoring a charter to protect temporary workers.
James Macdonald, Senior Winemaker at Hunter’s Wines, added that New Zealand’s Recognised Seasonal Employer programme was devised in 2007 following “a lot of bad press” about the mistreatment of temporary workers. The scheme now provides quality accommodation, controls over working hours, and a living wage for harvest workers. “The rate of return is above 90%”, he said, “people want to come to New Zealand and be part of this scheme.”
Bad press is a powerful motivator, it seems, but Werdmuller von Elgg stressed the importance of being “proactive, not reactive”. To do this, she said, it is very important not to silo those responsible: “the top people in organisations must be involved […] and companies need to have the confidence to be honest about any issues they find.” Without this reassurance, the temptation to turn a blind eye and hope for the best may be too strong for some.
Confidence comes from collaboration and compassion. Lukas Müller from Fair and Green, a sustainable certification integrating both environmental and social responsibility, called for more empathy for winegrowers: “we expect a lot from winery owners […] we are not there to check they are doing everything right, we are there to support them.” Fair and Green and Stronger Together have resources available for businesses looking to analyse and improve their supply chains, and many on the panel stressed the importance of collaborating with NGOs, but also with fellow producers, regional bodies, and the state. There’s a lot of help available, once people feel empowered to take it.
But the onus doesn’t just fall on producers: according to the panel, distributors, journalists, and consumers need to start talking, looking, and doing too. Daniel Hart, Director of Commerce at Hatch Mansfield, suggested the trade and press work together to devise and communicate a “fair price” for wine – a benchmark to reassure people they are buying an ethical product. “In the UK, the average price for a bottle of wine from South Africa [one of the biggest risk countries] is £5.50, including 80% tax”; drinkers need to understand that, like fast fashion, it’s virtually impossible to produce a socially responsible wine at this price point, and it’s up to the trade and journalists to explain why.
It’s time for us to start telling new stories about wine –about carbon, labour, and industry – but they don’t all need to be “dirty”. Peter Stanbury stressed at the beginning of the panel that journalism’s role needs to be “productive”; positive stories about environmental sustainability have brought us to a place where nature-first winemaking is widely discussed and, in many spheres, expected. I see no reason why similar stories about social sustainability – compassionate stories about producers who have looked, found, and acted – cannot do the same.
This was the first in a series of events The Wine Society plans to host on social responsibility. They have stuck their head over the proverbial parapet, now is the time for everyone else to follow.
