Harvest Report 2012

Friday, September 21st, 2012

The 2012 harvest is emerging as a particularly good one, both in terms of quality and volume, for the South African wine industry.

Inland wine growing areas recorded some of the best crops ever, while dwindling water supplies in the coastal region caused a systematic decrease in the anticipated crop over the season. The consequences of flood damage in the Orange River region in 2011 are still evident.

Crop size: The 2012 wine grape harvest amounts to 1 395 158 tons according to figures released by the SA Wine Industry Information and Systems (Sawis) on 29 August. This exceeds the 2011 crop by 7.1% and is only 2% smaller than the overall record crop of 2008.

The 2012 wine harvest – including juice and concentrate for non-alcoholic purposes, wine for brandy and distilling wine – is expected to amount to 1 083.5 million litres, calculated at an average recovery of 777 litres per ton of grapes.

2011/12 growing season: According to industry advisory body VinPro, the 2011 winter was particularly cold, ideal for vine dormancy. Conditions were however drier than usual with a negative effect on the water tables.

With August generally warmer than usual, bud burst was a week early in some blocks. Vineyards initially showed good growth at the start of the new growing season, but abnormally cold and rainy conditions later on resulted in uneven flowering and berry set with high disease pressure, which producers managed to control satisfactorily.

Weather conditions were back to normal in December, and less wind than usual resulted in less damage to grapevines than previous years. January was exceptionally hot, with heat waves resulting in sunburn damage in some instances. Dryland vineyards which already had little soil water resources were under particular pressure.

The ripening period in February and March was characterised by cool weather conditions for slow ripening, resulting in good colour and flavour development in red varieites especially, harvest typically delayed by two to three weeks. In addition, there was little rainfall which contributed to healthy grapes and the absence of diseases and rot.

In general, there is much excitement about the 2012 vintage, a specific characteristic being optimal ripeness levels achieved at lower sugars, this in turn leading to lower alcohol levels.

2012 winter: The 2012 winter was very cold with almost double the long-term average of cold units in some areas (a cold unit defined as one hour where the temperature stays within the range of 2.5°C and 9.1°C). Vineyards need a certain amount of cold during winter in order to make a definitive break out of dormancy and begin even growth in Spring (which ultimately goes towards even berry development and ripening) and 2013 therefore again looks set to be a particularly good harvest