Champagne what do we want in fifteen or twenty years

If champagne commentators detect in the Pascal Ferat election to the Presidency of the General Union of winegrowers (SGV) the return, after several years of absence, wine cooperatives, the main person prefers to see the return of "cooperation": "a certain State of mind to work together." Since 1990 at the head of the cooperative La Goutte d'Or virtues (Marne), which markets the brands Paul Goerg and Napoleon (close to 300,000 bottles a year), this wine vertusien, which also operates 11 hectares of vines on the prestigious White Coast, South of Epernay, knows the subtle art of assemblies which guarantee the continuity of quality. With his taste for clear speech, opinions which assert and the gathering, Pascal Ferat was the man for the job. He was able to reassure diverted winegrowers and sickened by the obscure internal crisis which violently shook the SGV in last December and January, and which resulted the exclusion of a President by the Board of Directors and then the resignation of his successor under the pressure of the troops.

Road map

"It is time that we return to the height," said the young fifty-three-year-old grandfather determined to tackle the task of "restore serenity, trust and credibility" to a groggy Union. Established in 1904, the SGV must ensure economic designation regulation and the development of the vineyard in respect of the balance with the trading that represents 67 of sales. With almost all of the approximately 15,000 wine farms of the appellation and 137 cooperatives, the SGV co-manages the die with the Union of the houses of champagne (UMC) in the interprofessional Committee of wine of Champagne (CIVC). As such, the Union of winegrowers intervenes on strategic and sensitive issues such as the determination of the quantities of grapes per hectare before each harvest, of planting rights or review-extension of the appellation area.

"Champagne what do we want in fifteen or twenty years." More area More or less of production "It is urgent to debate because Champagne lack of road map," said Pascal Ferat. In a few weeks, hopefully, this debate wave the locals that the Union runs in more than 300 wine-growing municipalities in the five departments of the appellation (Marne, Aube, Haute-Marne, Aisne and Seine-et-Marne). Only this large brainstorming is able in its eyes to flat files and federate a Union landscape rather fragmented around common objectives.

If Pascal Ferat knows to be teacher, remembering that it was a time Professor of viticulture and enology wine high school of Avize, in the Marne, he is also shown capable of flying in the storm. After the euphoria of the years of crazy growth, champagne descends on Earth, displaying for 2009 decreased by 9.1 to 293.3 million bottles sold. Prudent to thrill of recovery, including for export, recorded late 2009 and early 2010, Pascal Ferat wants to return to more modesty and retreating to always measured optimism. "The champagne winemaker is reasonable," he likes to repeat as a local man. "I am one of the last of the commune to be born in the family home," he says with a nothing of pride in her voice. And to clarify that two of his distant ancestors are buried in the cemetery of virtues under venerable Napoleonic tombs.