In the heart of Champagne, in a key location dedicated to innovation such as the Village by CA in Reims-Bezannes, the first edition of “Sparkling Wine Forum” will take place on June 20, 2023. This new event aims to act as a link between the research and development and innovation sectors at all levels of the sparkling wine value chain.
“Sparkling Wine Forum” wants to respond to the current problems of the actors in the sector, moreover, today inserted in an extremely dynamic economic context. Therefore, this first edition will address the theme, “How can sparkling wines cope with climate change?”.
First-ever event dedicated to research and innovation in the global sparkling wine industry
EFFEVENT, which also produces the VITeff fair in Epernay next October, has just revealed the program for this technical day, which foreshadows a real first in the world of sparkling wine, as Cyril Egoroff, EFFEVENT director, points out:
“Sparkling Wine Forum is an unprecedented event because of the quality of its speakers, both researchers and from corporate backgrounds. It is also unprecedented because it is the only event offered that brings together all sparkling wine professionals and aims to specifically address their needs and expectations. Through this event, we want to create a community of global effervescence professionals and offer them an annual event that reports on the latest research advances and reveals recent innovations developed by companies in the industry.”
Internationally renowned and of global reach speakers
More than 20 talks and 2 round tables will pace this day, which will be held under the patronage of the International Organization of Vine and Wine (OIV). In addition to the talk by Professor Luigi Moio, President of the OIV, several lectures will highlight recent work by renowned researchers from the Universities of Reims, Burgundy and Alsace, as well as the Neoma Business School.
The entire sparkling wine supply chain will be represented: research on new drought-resistant rootstocks, hybrid grape varieties, vine training forms, but also cutting-edge winemaking equipment, or even research and development applied to technologies that allow better control of malolactic fermentation in a context of high pH induced by global warming, etc.
Thanks to the collaboration with VINIDEA, an Italian company specializing in technical information for vine and wine professionals from all over the world, “Sparkling Wine Forum” will take on a strong international scope from its first edition. This is particularly evidenced by the presence of Monika Christmann, director of the Institute of Oenology at the Geisenheim University of Applied Sciences in Germany, who will speak on how to preserve the style of sparkling wines in the context of climate change. Researchers from the Universities of Tarragona and Valencia (Spain) or even Milan and Piacenza (Italy) will complete this picture.
There will also be several speakers from Champagne to affirm the leadership exercised by the champagne industry internationally. Thus MOËT HENNESSY will unveil how to combine know-how, science and technology to address the challenge of climate change. The group will present the themes of its research strategy, embodied in particular by the new Robert-Jean De Voguë center in Oiry.
It will also be possible to hear from innovative start-ups and SMEs that, for example, are developing electric self-driving crawlers and excavators in collaboration with the Champagne Committee, or that are applying a new system to monitor the quality of freshly harvested grapes: based on image analysis using Artificial Intelligence. It aims to better anticipate the effects of global warming on the final quality of sparkling wines.
