While discussing the ongoing grape harvest (Rtveli), the Minister of Environmental Protection and Agriculture, David Songhulashvili, highlighted ongoing reform in the winemaking sector. One of its primary goals is to incentivise high-quality grape production and boost the competitiveness of Georgian wine.

“This year we will have a harvest of the very finest quality, one of the most outstanding and largest in the history of independent Georgia. Georgian wine must be synonymous with quality. In years past, the more grapes a grower produced, the more he earned, and so he had no incentive to grow high-quality fruit. Georgian wine cannot be built on quantity, and every vine grower and winemaker knows this full well. That is precisely the purpose of the reform of the wine sector: to produce quality grapes, measured by their sugar content,” the Minister said.

According to Songhulashvili, the harvest in Kakheti is at its peak, and the crop intake is well organised.

“More than 206,000 tonnes of grapes have now been processed in Kakheti. The harvest coordination headquarters and the wineries are working around the clock. This year’s rtveli stands out for both its volume and its quality. Fine wine is impossible without fine grapes; quality wine is born in the vineyard. That is exactly why we are introducing a system of prices differentiated by grape quality, which gives growers the incentive to take even greater care over the quality of their fruit,” Songhulashvili said.