‘France is treating wine makers like drug dealers'

(TheLocal) - A French government plan to include reinforced health warnings for wine has gone down the wrong way with the country's wine industry chiefs. The head of the Bordeaux wine association tells The Local why the government's plan is akin to treating them like "drug dealers".

All is not well with France's famed wine industry.

Despite fears of a rise in wine taxes seemingly having been allayed by the country’s agriculture minister this week, industry leaders are still nursing a headache over government plans to reinforce health warnings on wine bottles and packaging.

In reaction to the plan, leaders of the wine industry – which represents France’s second-biggest export sector – have mobilised and created a lobby group Vin et Societé (Wine and Society) to take on the government.

It launched its publicity campaign last month, including a new website, which featured a photograph of French President François Hollande enjoying a glass of wine with the message: “Thank You, Mr President, for your support for our country’s second-largest export earner.”

What has riled the wine industry, however, apart from mooted tax hikes, is a plan to reinforce health warnings, including on wine bottles, as well as to ban positive talk about wine in the French media.

'Vin and Societé' have slammed the “moralising trend” which will “reduce personal responsibility” among French people.

According to Sud Ouest newspaper, the French government plans to change the warning from "Alcohol abuse is dangerous for your health" to "Alcohol is dangerous for your health".

For Bernard Farges, chair of CIVB (Comité interprofessionnel des Vins de Bordeaux), who recently described talks with the French government as "alarming", the change is "unacceptable" becasue "the concept of moderate drinking will disappear".

“You cannot warn about the dangers of alcohol or suggest how many glasses you should drink by putting it on a label on a bottle of wine. People need to be educated about this," Farges tells The Local.