Vino de Calidad de Granada, sun, altitude and balance
01/06/2011
There were three Vino de la Tierra quality labels dedicated to winemaking in the Andalusian province of Granada in 2005, and in that very same year, the winemakers who sold their wines under those quality labels decided to group together in order to lobby for the creation of an appellation to protect the wine of the entire province. In January 2009, the Andalusia Regional Government approved the quality label, Vino de Calidad de Granada and named the Granada Wine Association as its governing body. Currently the association is trying to gain recognition for the region’s wines under a designation of origin (DO) label basing its request on the province’s unique climatological and orographical conditions, its long winemaking tradition, and the Granada winemakers’ commitment to producing high quality products.
Granada’s winemaking tradition has benefited from the cultural wealth of the many and varied peoples who have graced the region with their presence. The earliest records about vine cultivation and winemaking in Granada date from Roman times and it is widely known that both wine commerce and consumption were of particular importance during the period of Islamic rule. A period in which, despite the prohibition imposed on wine consumption by the Islamic authorities, the arable land committed to vineyard and the sale of the product were not diminished. Wine production in Granada remained stable until the arrival of the phylloxera plague, towards the end of the 19th century, which however did not have the same dramatic impact as in the rest of the Spanish regions, although it did initiate a modernisation process in the selection of grape varieties to plant and in the vinification and ageing processes.
Vino de Calidad de Granada was recognised by the Andalusia Regional Government in January 2009, becoming one of the prestigious Vinos de Calidad Producidos en Regiones Determinadas (VCPRD) (Quality Wines Produced in Specified Regions QWpsr). That same year, the European Commission unified quality standards and Vino de Calidad de Granada fell under the category of Protected Designations of Origin, subsequently focusing its efforts on opting for the status of DO with the Granada Wine Association in the role of governing body.
