MOTHER OF VINE

Viticulture practitioners across the globe are progressively embracing natural and sustainable farming methods

- Mei Anne Foo

More and more producers are making biodynamic wines. Demeter International, a governing body that sets the official standards for biodynamic farming globally, has certified about 616 biodynamic wine producers so far — more than 5 percent of the world’s vineyards today. A couple of decades ago, that figure was less than 1 percent.

At the outset, biodynamic wine seemed sort of shaggy. But in the early 2010s, something changed, and natural wine began cropping up on menus in New York, Montreal, London and other hipper quadrants of Europe. This new type of wine suited with a wider transformation in taste, as vague waffles such as “natural” and “artisanal” became buzzwords for sophistication, and consumers found themselves wanting to dine at farm-to-table restaurants and furnishing their homes with industrial fittings and reclaimed wood.

Ms. Cynthia Chua, CEO of Spa Esprit Group and a champion of bringing natural wines to Singaporean consumers, provides her insights into this trend. “I believe the appeal of natural wines today comes from the fact that consumers are increasingly conscious about what they consume. They want the food on their plate to be very honest, and they are increasingly inquisitive about where the produce is from and how much or little has been done to it to truly allow the produce to shine,” she says. “In the same vein, natural wines simply bring us back to the way wines were originally made — with minimal intervention from chemical or modern technology, both on the vine and in the winemaking process. It allows consumers to feel good about what they’re putting in their bodies, especially in these times when there’s a general unease about pollution and toxins in our water and soil. Local palates are veering towards a more artisanal slant as well, which works to its favor.”