Free Republic

French wineries are in crisis because they say the government's program to curb drunken driving is cutting into their profits. That campaign began in 2002 when President Jacques Chirac vowed to reduce alcohol-related crashes, which had been killing 45,000 Frenchmen a year. The toll has dropped, but so have the profits of the wine industry, which is vital to the French economy because it employs 500,000 in a country where the jobless rate exceeds 9 percent and socialist policies allow the French to make sloth a career. At least 6,000 winemakers staged what was described as "spirited demonstrations" last week...

PARIS (AP) - Wine is less a beverage than an elixir of life in France, but the country's vintners say they're vexed by a problem that threatens their livelihood - too much of a good thing and not enough people drinking it. Pinched by overproduction, shrinking exports, advertising restrictions, an aggressive campaign against alcohol abuse and changing drinking habits, at least 6,000 growers and winemakers staged spirited demonstrations nationwide Wednesday to press the government for help. ``We are a sector in crisis,'' said Jean-Michel Lemetayer, the head of France's main farmer union, urging the state to bail out an industry...

French Wine Growers Protest Weak Market 1 hour, 56 minutes ago World - AP By WILLIAM J. KOLE, Associated Press Writer PARIS - Wine is less a beverage than an elixir of life in France, but the country's vintners say they're vexed by a problem that threatens their livelihood — too much of a good thing and not enough people drinking it. Pinched by overproduction, shrinking exports, advertising restrictions, an aggressive campaign against alcohol abuse and changing drinking habits, at least 6,000 growers and winemakers staged spirited demonstrations nationwide Wednesday to press the government for help. "We are a sector...

French wine exports are in their sixth successive year of decline. Thousands of winemakers have staged protests in the streets of France to demand government help over falling exports and a slump in domestic sales. Demonstrators in Avignon, Bordeaux, Macon, Angers, Nantes and other towns rallied behind black-draped tractors. They blame over-production, shrinking exports and a government campaign against alcohol abuse for what union leaders call a "crisis" in winemaking. France's agriculture ministry said it would meet industry leaders next week. The unions want the government to provide money for farmers wishing to move from vines to other crops and...

Paris – Some of the finest noses in the French wine world are snorting into their decanters over a new film which claims they are complicit in the American-led homogenisation of world tastes and the steady destruction of France's centuries-old tradition of "terroir." "Mondovino", a low-budget documentary by American sommelier-turned-filmmaker Jonathan Nossiter, has been a surprise hit at the box-office since it opened last month — pulling in some 200,000 viewers — but the reaction among many in the wine-making establishment has been as sour as a corked bottle of chateau plonk. "The most hacked off are the people with...

PARIS, Oct 22 (AFP) - French wine exports are continuing to shrink this year, confirming a six-year trend that has brought gloom to the sector, experts and industry bodies say. The amount of wine sent out of France fell 5.6 percent in terms of volume over the first eight months of this year compared with the same period last year, not including Champagne and other sparkling varieties, according to the Federation of Wine and Spirits Exporters (FEVS). In terms of value, the drop represents a 9.6 percent decline. Between January and the end of August, EUR 4.5 billion worth of...

PARIS (AP) - Winegrowers in northeast France are puzzled over the mysterious destruction of large swaths of two vineyards in Alsace, a region along the German border known for full-bodied white wines. Saboteurs using long-handled pruning shears destroyed about 2,800 grape vines in the past two weeks by slashing their stems close to the soil, the director of the Alsace Wine Growers Association said Friday. "We don't really know who could have done this, whether it's the work of a lunatic - or if it's a settling of scores," Jean-Paul Goulby said. "It's very strange." The value of the damage...

Changing tastes, falling consumption create difficulty for small wineries. LISTRAC-MEDOC, France - Maryse Meyre is bewildered. Her family has been successfully making wine for five generations here in France's world-famous Bordeaux region. But in the last few years, sales have crashed. "It's a catastrophe," she said as she escorted visitors through the fragrant winery, with its rooms full of oak barrels and shelves of vintages dating to 1929. "I don't understand, because we have changed nothing. On the contrary, the wine is better, because we have better technology." That may be true, but it hasn't staved off a crisis in...

The industry is facing a crisis, but even desperate measures may not restore its lost grandeur. First, a rash of competitors -- Australia, Chile and South Africa, plus Italy and Spain -- showed dramatic gains in quality and quantity. Next, a soaring Euro soared made France's already pricey bottles cost even more in the United States, the world's biggest wine market. Then the controversial war in Iraq led to scattered U.S. boycotts and a frantic response by pro-American winemakers to "ignore our politicians, s'il vous plait." As recently as the 1990s, one in three imported bottles bought by Americans was...

U.S. taste for French wine: soured? By CBS.MarketWatch.com Last Update: 3:29 PM ET May 18, 2003 WASHINGTON (CBS.MW) -- Bilateral friction stemming from France's unwillingness to support the U.S.-led war against Iraq has spilled into American's taste for wine, according to a recently published report. April sales of top French wine labels fell nearly 9 percent in the U.S., compared with the same month in 2002, The Washington Times reported this weekend, citing a survey conducted by the Chicago market researcher Information Resources Inc. First-quarter figures had failed to show the same shift in consumer behavior. French wine imports increased...

NEW BRUNSWICK: The Old Bay Restaurant's owner lashed out at France on Friday -- flushing nearly $1,000 in French wine and champagne down a toilet to protest the country's lack of support for the United State's position on Iraq. In response, local folk singer Spook Handy is spearheading an Old Bay Boycott. "The Old Bay is for the war and is apparently willing to attack any party that disagrees," he wrote in a mass e-mail distributed yesterday. Owner Anthony Tola had no comment yesterday about the proposed boycott. Handy of Cranbury urged bands and patrons alike in his e-mail to...

Their vintage French wine is down the drain, but the owners of The Chophouse restaurant in Reno report booming business since bidding a well-publicized adieu to their champagne, Bordeaux and premier grand cru.