N.Z. Wines Found Up To Best Standard

Press, Volume C, Issue 29681, 27 November 1961, Page 17

N.Z. Wines Found Up To Best Standard

(New Zealand Press Association)

AUCKLAND, Nov. 26. Mr G. Mazuran, president of the New Zealand Vitioultural Association, has returned to h>is Henderson vineyard from the Continent with somewhat mixed feelings.

In Rome he was disappointed to be served an extremely bad, loose wine in a good restaurant but at Ljubljana, Jugoslavia, where the 1961 International Wine Fair was held he saw his own and also wines of two other Henderson and Hawke’s Bay growers more than hold their own with the best of Continental wines. On the basis of the New Zealand wines’ successes at the fair and his own round of “tasting,” Mr Mazuran has returned with the firm opinion that wines made here arc first-class. “Some of the Continental people were amazed at the quality of our wines,” he said. This was so much so that blenders and shippers were asking if any of the good New Zealand wines were available for export. “I had to say we could hardly cope with our home demand,” said Mr Mazuran. But the approaches had demonstrated the scope for any surplus New Zealand might produce. Far from New Zealand having anything to learn from the Continent the winegrowers there were adopting methods that are standard practice in New Zealand, he said. “They are planting the vines further apart to

allow machinery to be used.” Comparing the normal Coutinental yields of two to three tons an acre with New Zealand production of 8-10 and last year up to 20 tons an acre, Mr Mazuran said that yet another theory had been discredited. Tests in France proved that increasing the quantity of production did not reduce the quality. Referring to the restaurant in Rome, he said a considerable percentage of the wine sold in Continental countries would be considered substandard here. “Some of the wine you are given in good restaurants there we would never serve.”

But the Jugoslavian government, sensitive to the discredit poor wines could bring, had decreed that wine must be bottled by the grower and retailed as such be sure the quality, Mr Mazuran said.