(Dave Bedard photo)

Bayer issues fungicide warning for wine grape growers

Reading Time: 2 minutes Zurich | Reuters — Germany’s Bayer has advised wine grape growers not to use its Moon Privilege fungicide until its Bayer CropScience arm has investigated whether there’s a connection between the product’s use and reported crop damage. Growers have reported deformed leaves and lower yields from their crops this year. Referring to “atypical symptoms” in […] Read more

(Peggy Greb photo courtesy ARS/USDA)

Canada preparing shorter list of tariff targets in COOL fight

Reading Time: 2 minutes Winnipeg | Reuters — Canada is whittling down its list of U.S. products that it may hit with steep tariffs in retaliation against contentious meat-labeling laws, Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz said on Tuesday. The Canadian government is likely to target beef, pork, California wines, mattresses, cherries and office furniture, possibly along with other goods, from […] Read more


EU lawmakers urge calorie content labels to cover alcohol

Reading Time: < 1 minute Brussels | Reuters — European beer, wine and spirits makers should inform consumers about the amount of calories in their drinks via clear labelling, EU lawmakers said Wednesday. Most foods and drinks are subject to legislation mandating labels with nutritional and ingredient information, but alcoholic drinks are exempt. The European Parliament voted in favour of […] Read more

Ontario’s Trade Minister Michael Chan and Agriculture Minister Jeff Leal check out Ontario VQA wine on sale at a BHG grocery store in Beijing on April 18. (Ontario.ca)

China’s wine growers beat France into second place

Reading Time: 2 minutes Paris | Reuters — China overtook France last year as the world’s second largest wine grower by area under cultivation as it continued to plant vast fields of mostly imported grape vines to meet growing demand. The world’s second largest economy, which since 2013 consumes more red wine than any other country, has more than […] Read more


(Scott Bauer photo courtesy ARS/USDA)

New chemistry launched as fruit mite control

Reading Time: < 1 minute The first member of the benzoylacetonitrile group of crop insecticides (Group 25) to come to market in North America will be a mite control for fruit crops. BASF Canada announced Tuesday it has picked up registration for Nealta, a 200-gram-per-litre suspension concentrate of cyflumetofen, billed as a control for all life stages of tetranychid mites […] Read more

Sask., B.C. reach deal on direct wine, spirits sales

Reading Time: 2 minutes Consumers in each of British Columbia and Saskatchewan may be able to order wine and craft spirits directly from the other province’s producers, starting next summer, without having to involve the Crown or third-party vendors. Saskatchewan Premier Brad Wall and B.C. Premier Christy Clark announced an agreement Friday they said will “lift barriers to consumers […] Read more


N.S. sets up wine development board

Reading Time: < 1 minute Grape growers and wine producers in Nova Scotia have got a new advisory board to bring their ideas and issues to the provincial government. The province on Tuesday named nine members, including Agriculture Minister Keith Colwell as chairman, to a new Nova Scotia Wine Development Board. Nova Scotia’s wineries sold almost $16.7 million in wine […] Read more

California wine country quake losses seen in billions

Reading Time: 3 minutes Napa, California | Reuters — A strong earthquake that jolted residents of California’s Napa Valley wine country from their beds on Sunday caused insured property damage likely in the hundreds of millions of dollars, but the region’s total economic losses will be several times that, experts said on Monday. The magnitude 6.0 quake, the biggest […] Read more


The old-vintages cellar at Chateau Haut-Brion. Collectors of fine wines such as Haut-Brion could have earned annualized real returns of 4.1 per cent on their investment between 1900 and 2012, a study shows. (DomainClarenceDillon.com)

Red wine a winning investment in 20th century

Reading Time: 2 minutes London | Reuters — Forget government bonds, fine art and even stamps: red wine outperformed them all over the 20th century. At least that’s what research by a team of academics from the University of Cambridge, HEC Paris and Vanderbilt University of Nashville shows. The Warren Buffetts of the fine wine world could have earned […] Read more

U.S. becomes world’s biggest wine market as French drinkers cut down

Reading Time: 3 minutes Paris | Reuters — The United States became the world’s biggest market for wine last year, beating France into second place for the first time as consumption slides in the country long seen as its natural home and Americans develop a greater taste for it. U.S. consumers bought 29.1 million hectolitres of wine in 2013, […] Read more