UNIONE ITALIANA VINI elected its new Executive Board with four new entries and it is ready to face the hot topics of the three-year period 2019-2022.
“With enthusiasm and high sense of responsibility I accept to continue this important mandate. I thank the outgoing board for the work carried out and the new board for the trust I have been given. In the next three years, we await great challenges nationwide and worldwide. However, UIV is ready to face them. Our strong point is our base of knowledge, capabilities and collaborations, strengthened also by the contribution of the Movement of Wine Tourism, of Wine Women and of the scientific world, which we put at the disposal not only of enterprises, but also of institutions and of the wine production chain, in order to facilitate the identification of technical, regulatory and political decisions, capable of meeting the challenges of the sector. In Rome, Paris and Brussels, we will continue to take part in all institutional meeting tables of the sector and in the international organisations, in order to have the voice of our companies heard”.
These are the words of Ernesto Abbona, re-elected as President of Unione Italiana Vini last 27 June in Milan: he lays the foundations for its new mandate, thanking the new Board, whose members belong to the major Italian wine-growing regions and include representative entrepreneurial figures of all stages in the wine-production chain. The President will be supported by the Currently Assistant Vice-President,Lamberto Frescobaldi, who will have the task to preside over the Federation of Vine Growers and Winemakers, and by the Vice-President, Sandro Sartor, who will lead the Federation of Wine Trade and Industry. There are four new entries and two of them are among vine growers and winemakers: Marina Cvetic, leading the historical winery in the region Abruzzo, and Giuseppe Fugatti, owner of the farm business Roeno in Valdadige (Veneto). The Federation of Wine Trade is enriched with the experience of Michele Bernetti, leading Umani Ronchi brand in the region Marche. New entry in the Federation of Vinegars is Maria Bellei: in the Region Emilia-Romagna, her family has been producing balsamic vinegars in Casoni di Ravarino, in the province of Modena, since the nineteenth century.
In an economic situation that is difficult for the sector and in an economic-political framework that is complex for Italy and the European Union, the choice of the Board to operate in a “logic of continuity” is expression of the good work done in the last period, which laid solid foundations for the activities planned in the three-year period 2019-2022. There are indeed many open topics.
On an international level, the issues are ranging from the Pac post 2020, whose budget is linked with that of wine, to the international agreements, such as the EU-Mercosur Treaty, just signed, for which the detail results of wine are awaited. The national front is also very articulated. Important amendment proposals will regard the Consolidated Act of Vine and Wine (Law 238), the revision of the number of wine designations and the development of wine tourism, with the study of global strategies to be adopted, in order to give the enterprises concrete growth opportunity. Moreover, as a promotional initiative, the Association will continue the work of the ‘technical table’ organised with ICE Italian Trade Agency to improve the activities supporting Italian wine in the markets with higher added value, in the developing markets and in Europe, in order to strengthen the positioning of “Made in Italy” products.
“Nevertheless, the challenges of the future are not only on the shelves or in the lines of EC regulations – points out President Ernesto Abbona – but they are called “environmental sustainability” and “climate change”. Therefore, we are ready to give our expert contribution to the process started by Mipaaft with regard to a harmonization of an Italian definition of sustainable wine, which has to be supported by a reliable system of certification and inspections and extended all over Europe. Finally, we will continue our battles to defend the image and culture of wine and, together with Ceev-Comité Vins, we will work on the new phase of Wine in Moderation* that will be soon relaunched. The next three years – concludes the President – will certainly be demanding, but I know I can rely on a Board capable of working as a team in every situation, confirming Unione Italiana Vini as the main institutional point of reference for the vine-growing and wine-making world nationwide”.