South African wines finally getting attention abroad

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The wine production plant at the Graham Beck wine estate in Robertson, South Africa. President Obama reportedly is a fan of Graham Beck bubbly, which he first tried during dinner at Blackbird restaurant in Chicago.

JOHANNESBURG - South Africans recently celebrated the 350th anniversary of their wine industry, proudly noting that it is generations older than any New World wines from Australia or South America.

The wines are relatively new to the international market, however, because decades of United Nations sanctions against the country's white supremacist government made it a rare commodity until Mandela won the first democratic elections in 1994.

South African wines make up less than 1 percent of U.S. wine imports, said Etienne Heyns, who does marketing and sales for South Africa's Graham Beck Wines. But the United States represents a growing market, and South Africa's wines are getting increasing attention there.

"Forgive me if I'm excited, but I can't help it. I want to tell you straight out that South Africa, of all places, is one of the greatest sources for moderately priced cabernet sauvignon on the planet today," New York Times wine critic Eric Asimov gushed in one of his columns.

The first to plant vines on southern African soil was Dutch explorer and colony leader Jan van Riebeeck, in 1655, three years after he made land at the Cape of Good Hope.

Wine-growing today remains centered around the Cape, with vineyards stretching over 500 miles and 250,000 acres from the slopes of rugged mountains to open plains and river valleys, most near the Atlantic coast. Old estates boast centuries-old villas and most offer wine-tasting to visitors.

South Africa is the ninth-biggest producer of wines in the world yet it has one of the lowest consumption rates of any wine-growing country. Experts blame the apartheid era, when few blacks could afford wine.

With a few exceptions, wine estate owners still are almost all white in South Africa. But bigger producers are starting to look at the growing market among middle-class urban blacks.

September's Soweto Wine Festival drew 4,500 people who tasted 850 wines in the black township outside Johannesburg better known for its protests and police raids during apartheid.

Wines of South Africa, which represents 360 exporters, said 2008 was a record year with more than 840 million pints exported, an increase of 32 percent over 2007, despite tough global trading conditions that saw declines in the exports of competitors.

Nearly 20 percent of Graham Beck's inventory is sold in the United States, some 84,000 bottles each year.

The United States also is about the only place in the world where there is substantial growth in wine consumption.

"The entire South African wine industry is looking at the U.S. as its future hope for commercial success," Heyns said.

AP