VICE PRESIDENT BUSSI: “THE ROLE OF THE WINEGROWER IS DETERMINANT WITH SUCH UNSTABLE CLIMATE CONDITIONS”.
The 2024 harvest in Alta Langa began with the first bunches of Pinot Noir and will continue in the next few days with the Chardonnay grapes.
It has started in the earliest and sunniest areas of Strevi (AL), Serralunga d’Alba (CN) and Castel Rocchero (AT), in the next few days the harvest will get into full swing going up towards the vineyards at increasingly higher altitudes, such as Roddino (CN) and Bossolasco (CN), where veraison is not yet complete. Except for some slight reduction in yield due to unstable weather conditions at the time of flowering, what is expected is a quantitatively average harvest with good quality grapes.
The season was characterized by a rise in temperatures at the beginning of spring, followed by a rather rainy and cool period: precipitation was about double the average, making the 2024 agricultural year the rainiest in the last 67 years. In the vineyards of the provinces of Asti, Cuneo and Alessandria, the experience and timely intervention of the winemakers were therefore even more fundamental to avoid the appearance of plant diseases.
With the arrival of summer, conditions re-stabilized, allowing for regular ripening of the grapes: this placed the harvest period between the last ten days of August and the beginning of September.
“ We are confident that the year that has begun can be an excellent one, thanks to the constant commitment of our winemakers – says vice president Giovanni Carlo Bussi – the grapes are beautiful and healthy. In fact, in a context in which the climatic conditions are less predictable, the role of the winemaker is increasingly crucial. Also for this reason, in recent months the Alta Langa Consortium has started a series of events dedicated to its members, in order to spread knowledge of the best agronomic techniques in the vineyard and consolidate the high quality levels of the grapes destined to become Alta Langa DOCG ”.
THE ALTA LANGA CONSORTIUM
The Alta Langa Consortium was founded in 2001, after many years of in-depth, methodical and documented research and studies on the area’s vocation. It brings together passionate and far-sighted winemakers and producers who, driven by great Piedmontese pride, founded and grew this young denomination but with deep roots that sink into history and the territory. The great challenge that unites everyone is to produce a necessarily important wine, which will not be ready for six years after the vineyards are planted.
To date, the Consortium has more than 80 sparkling wine producers and 90 associated winemakers. Since 2022, the president of the Consortium has been Mariacristina Castelletta , and the vice-president is Giovanni Carlo Bussi .
ALTA LANGA DOCG
Alta Langa DOCG has the honour of representing the first classic method in Italy, born in Piedmont in the mid-1800s .
The denomination has a production of 3,200,000 bottles from the 2023 harvest. Alta Langa Docg is made with Pinot Noir and Chardonnay grapes, pure or together in variable percentages; it can be white or rosé, brut or pas dosé and has very long aging times on the yeasts, as required by the strict regulations: at least 30 months. A distinctive feature of Alta Langa is that it is an exclusively vintage sparkling wine, that is, the fruit of a single harvest: each bottle always shows the year of the grape harvest on the label, inextricably linked to the particular characteristics of that specific harvest. It is produced in a hilly area (over 250 meters above sea level) that embraces the provinces of Asti, Cuneo and Alessandria: a land that looks at the snow-capped peaks of the Alps and breathes the sea and that collects the legacy preserved by the ancestors, kept intact for a long time without undergoing radical transformations, as instead happened in the lower hills. The Alta Langa is a precious territory, to be supported, in which biodiversity is safeguarded. A literary land, an extraordinary land of resistance – of wars and cultures -, which has faced changes and supported them without losing its baggage of memories and its strong identity.
Alta Langa obtained the DOC in 2002 and the DOCG in 2011 (retroactive to the 2008 vintage).
THE NUMBERS OF THE CONSORTIUM AND OF THE ALTA LANGA DOCG:
- Over 80 sparkling wine producers associated with the Consortium
- 455 hectares of vineyards between the provinces of Alessandria (46), Asti (185) and Cuneo (224)
- The Alta Langa vineyard is cultivated for 2/3 Pinot Noir and 1/3 Chardonnay
- 3,200,000 bottles produced from the 2023 harvest
- Domestic market: 90%
- Export: 10%