Terroirism

'Terroir' is a French word with no exact equivalent in English. It does nonetheless pack a lot of meaning into the one word. In wine terms, it means the sum of all the factors that go to a wine – location, soil, climate, weather, human TLC of the grapes and soil, and so on. The usefulness of the word to embrace the spectrum of science and art that goes to producing wine means that its use is becoming widespread in English. Now, I am seeing its use in foods too – cheese, olive oils, and so on.

Some of this is pure marketing. I have nothing against marketing the terroir of a product, unless the statement is just seeking fame by association, i.e. we are from the Margaret River, therefore we are good. A more astute statement of terroir is that the maker of the product has gone to a lot of trouble to select the site, choose the best clone or variety, and rigorously brought the best of practice and technology to bear to produce the best product.

A related development is as the Australian wine industry scrambles to find new markets as a higher dollar and international competitors erode its traditional ones. Part of the new push is to stress the regionality of the wine. Many of the better wines in France are defined on the label not by the grape, but by the name of the producer, with a geographic allusion. In Australia, we might think of buying a Chardonnay or a Shiraz. In France, customers will buy a Bordeaux or Burgundy.

Australia's wine industry is moving to add more regionality to the marketing appeal of its wine, on the basis that customers increasingly want to know the back-story of the wine - where, how and who made it. The 'where' has always played a role in marketing premium wine. Regions such as the Barossa, Hunter, Yarra, and Clare have defined and promoted themselves very successfully. However, particularly in international markets, much Australian wine is promoted as a fruit-forward, inexpensive, brightly labelled product of South East Australia. This higher-level geographic statement does not add any marketing value, and while it cannot be avoided where wines are blended from grapes sourced from many locations, there is a stronger emphasis, especially with premium wines, on a greater sense of association with a particular location that has a unique wine style and heritage and lineage. Terroir is an aspect of that and it is a word you will hear a lot more of in coming years.