Grape harvest almost over

When, two years ago, Russia closed its market for Georgian wine, serious problems began for Georgian grape farmers and vintners.

The farmers could not sell the harvested grapes because the wine factories didn’t have enough capacity to store the new wine they would make. So they bought fewer grapes at lower cost.

The 2008 grape harvest has gone off more or less without incident so far for two reasons; the harvest wasn’t big and the state has subsidized the industry. In 2008, it was expected that only 145,000 tonnes of grapes would be harvested (in 2007, the harvest was 227,300 tonnes), and bad weather conditions destroyed a certain number of grapes in some districts. The state also allotted GEL 21.5 million to support the grape-gathering process this year, of which 12.5 went to winemakers and 9 million to farmers.

By mid October, more than 70% of Georgia’s grapes had been harvested.