Logroño (EFE).- «Let’s leave politics apart from wine (from Rioja); let’s do the best possible, that each one does the best possible and that it can be sold at a fair price so that everyone wins”, since this “will make the DOCa Rioja stronger”, said this Tuesday the president of La Rioja, Concha Andreu.
Andreu has spoken, in statements to journalists, in relation to the recent constitution of the “Viñedos de Alava” Designation of Origin (PDO) Regulatory Council, whose objective is to obtain the first wine of the 2023 harvest.
The president of the La Rioja Government added that “introducing political issues to want to weaken (the DOCa Rioja – made up of vineyards from La Rioja, the Basque Country and Navarra) is going to fall by its weight”, since “the potential that Rioja has It is so important that this denomination will be one hundred years old in 2025”.
The head of the La Rioja Executive added that her Government “is clear that the (Rioja) sector is well protected by the norm and accompaniment of the Regulatory Council of the Qualified Designation of Origin (DOCa) Rioja”.
The Ministry of Agriculture, as indicated by its owner, Luis Planas, Andreu has assured, “supports the uniqueness and unity of Rioja”, a position also recently supported by the head of the Geographical Indications Unit in the General Directorate of Agriculture of the European Commission, Joao Onofre, who said in Logroño that the European Union will not approve the creation of Viñedos de Alava without the agreement of the Government of Spain, which “currently does not have it”.
The President of the Government of La Rioja has also stressed that, as an oenologist, she knows the wine sector “well” because she has made wine, but also because she has worked with winegrowers from Rioja Alavesa and, in this matter of Viñedos de Alava, “I see that Indeed, there is a specific interest of one or more people to mobilize and it is a political interest».
The presidency and general direction of the Regulatory Council of the DOCa Rioja has avoided making statements in relation to this matter, as reported to EFE in this body. EFE.