Ep. 77 Monty Waldin interviews Graziano Molon (Consorzio Vini del Trentino) | Italian Wine Coops

Italian wine podcast. Chinching with Italian wine people. This podcast has been recorded during Vivite an event organized by the the Alliance of Italian corps. Hello. This is the Italian wine podcast. My name is Monte Ward. My guest today is and Gracciano is the director of consortio Vini Trentino. Right. So, right. What does consortio Vino Trentino mean? And, what is it? I am and, actually, is a wine consort this part of a beautiful, Taliban region in the north part of Italy. So you're a cooperative? Yes. We have a cooperative. How many members do you have? More or less hundred among them, eleven big comparatives, sir, and a lot of, whiners and whiner is a smaller one. Do you like a group of cooperatives that you you reunite various smaller cooperatives under one one banner? Actually, we manage all, all these. So the big the medium and and the small size. Okay. Producers. In terms of your vineyards, roughly, how many hectares are we talking about? Ten thousand. Yes, ma'am. So ten thousand hectares. Yes. And the annual wine production roughly. Roughly about one million, Hector. Hectoliters. Okay. So million hectoliters. And what are your main grape varieties for white wine and and then for red? The the main grape, white grapes, the first one is, pinot grigio. The famous at the second chardonnay. And then we have, okay, a part of the production, only more or less twenty five percent, the red grapes, the king of the red Tarant red grapes is the Teraldago, coming from the Germany tirolar gold. So the gold from tirol, tyrol, as you like. And, we also have some, very famous wine like, Martimino. It's, our famous famous grapevine because, mozart, the famous composer and musician, he used to like, very much in the masters. Okay. I didn't I didn't know Mozart took his name from the Martimino grapevine. Yes. You you learned he something new every day. Okay. So in terms of, in terms of your market, what is your market in Italy and your market abroad? What's the percentage of sales? We have to, divide into two different sites. First is the extra market. The US is the first market, and, of course, the number one, it's been a bridge. It's very important to support. The second market is Germany traditionally because, you know, our region is near the border with Austria. So, if the region is going north. And the third match is UK. And then, we have, actually, quite interesting, growing market in the Asian area, like China and Japan. And, very interesting for our sparkling wine. The initial markets, first export market, the US, second, Germany and third UK. Your sales in Italy, what percentage of turnover? It's volume, which I'm Yes. The volume, it's it's difficult to say. So around the eighty, eighty five million bottles, so in the totally. So the the turnover is very difficult because, our big company is in Italy. So they have a a value volume in Italy, but also they export a lot. Okay. And then we have not given a full volume of of exports. Right. Okay. So in terms of pinot grillo, if you're selling a bottle of pinot grillo in America Yep. And you're selling one Germany, and one to, say, China. Are there any stylistic differences in terms of residual sugar for those three, you know, really dear ones? Do you style them slightly differently? Actually, you know, because, you know, you know, you know, you know, work also with other region in terms of, production of wine. So we collect the wine for another producers, and we sell it from Tondino. I mean, there is a very typical production from, mountain from Pino Grijo. And this belong to Trentos. It's very interesting. So what's the difference between uh-uh, of Pino Grijo grown in your mountainous area and say one grown on flatter ground, maybe in, I don't know, truly or something. Yeah. Actually, they're radically different. You know? Now, through the DOCio you know, Guidro don't have a Netcea. There is a a a huge, you know, Gridro area, but we try to make differences among the different regions. So each region has different taste and different parts where the diguugeo can create, that it can grow and and have a different tasties. But is that useful for you when you're making a blend, for example, for the American market? So we take a little bit of being agreed here from the mountains, a bit from the plain. Yeah. We blend them together. It's depend on the taste and, on the trend on different markets. And I would like to underline that maybe our real a good production of Tarant distinctive for other region is the sparkling wine, the method of classical, you know, the famous Trento doc. So what is a what is a traditional blend for the for the classic method sparkling wine? Classic method of sparkling wine. Traditional blend is a mix of, chardonnay and pinot noir. Okay. This is a very important chardonnay on average between five hundred and seven hundred meters, so quite high. So the case is very different. And how long do the wines typically stay on the leaves before they're discharged and bottle and sent to sale. Normally, between, twenty five and sixty three months. Okay. And what? It depends on normal or several. What about, initiatives regarding, say, sustainability, which is kind of like one step towards organics and may be organics itself. Is that easy in these mountainous conditions? Actually, it's not easy, but thank you for the question because, we are now waiting for the second certification of all our territory into you know, we have the first region in Italy that certificates with the system, SQNV, assessed, systema, the quality, political, and integrated. This is a national certification for the integrated stability, and it's very important because it's the first time Italy, almost, all regions certificate, all the producer. But do people see that as, when they get the it's is it the SNQA? Yep. When they get that certification, they say, okay. I'm I'm reducing my use of herbicide. I may be eliminating one insecticide. I'm using a little bit less of another insecticide. Exactly. Do but do people see that as as the end of the story, or do they think maybe this is a good step towards say organics or even biodynamics? Do do your growers think that? Or You know, talking about organics for all the production is more a dream. It would be in a a beauty a beautiful word, but it's not easy. It is it is yet so simple. I think it's Is that because of the labor cost because you're on steep slopes often, and it is very hard to deal with weeds on first one, thirty three, second one, we are mountain territory. So it's very difficult to, you know, to to to think about. There is, of course, a growing, Hector area from organic production, but compared with all the production is difficult. So now we have the first step, talking about the integrated production where we reduced in a extremely way all the video cover maps, all the problematic, substances. That's very important. So we take care of, about our land. We take care about the population. We take care about our tourists because Tarantino works a lot with theories in summer and winter. And it's very important we give a a positive measure that we take care of our territory. Of course, we are looking forward. And, we are trying to improve, step by step, the organic production. It's not so easy. How about climate change? You say, obviously, you think you're in an alpine area. It's gonna be really cold and everybody's gonna be going skiing every day, but it's not it. As you said, it's a very hot area. Is it getting hotter? Absolutely. This is the second very good question. We noticed in the last ten years that climate changes are extremely, but tremendous, changes. Donald Donald Trump would say that was fake news, but anyway No. No. Actually, actually unfortunately, no. Actually, no. So we have, for example, the last five years, a lot of problem with, damages with, plan meet the condition with, you have problem with, disease, but naturally, we don't. We we didn't have for the last twenty years. So you can really notice, tremendous changes in the last five years. How do you deal with that though? I I think we have to change our mind before we try to change the climate. So we have to adapt ourselves on a very challenging climate, and probably try to work on, genomic, of the one year's, to adapt them for the future. So you're not you're not thinking about, cultural responses, like, maybe pruning a little bit differently, managing, maybe managing the interos a bit differently in terms plowing and things like that. It does that clear part as well. Absolutely. You know, a correct approach to the agriculture method is very important to compete and to deal, of this climate message. Are you working with any disease resistant varieties or, in hotter climate varieties. We are in a in a very positive cooperation with the foundation at Monmach. This is a foundation, institutional research foundation since more than one ensury in Truntino. And it's very important. We have a lot of programs, a corporation program for research and for genomic, researchers. So I wanna say thanks to our guest today, Graciano Malone, who's the the directory of the Vini Frentino cooperative group. Yep. Been great to talk to you, talking about climate change and, initiatives and all the rest of it. And I wish you every success with your sales, and I hope to come and see you sometime. Okay. Thank you very much for everything. Welcome, rico, thanks. This episode has been brought to you by Vin Italy twenty eighteen, taking place in Verona from April fifteenth to eighteenth. Vin Italy is the wine exhibition to help you discover and get to know Italian wine and features over four thousand two hundred wineries. Follow Italian wine podcast on Facebook and Instagram.