It’s a matter of regret that the issue of whether or not wine should continue to be sealed with cork has degenerated to of a war of words and publicity. Matters like technical soundness and reliability have taken a back seat. For soundness and reliability is what the wine industry deserves, not the trumpetings of cork companies and their media representatives, whose contributions have done little but to further alienate the cork industry from very the market they seek to supply. At no other time can I recall as many winemakers and technical directors so deeply angry and upset over the cork lobby. It’s possible to reduce the debate into some fundamental truths. Firstly, the wine industry owes the cork industry the power of gratitude for having provided it with a quality seal over the past two centuries. Who knows what sort of condition the global wine industry would be in right now were it not for the cork? The cork industry begrudgingly recognises the existence of cork taint, although it does its level best to diminish its importance and incidence. At present around 4.5% of Australian wines sealed with corks exhibit some degree of cork taint, a view supported by large companies and surveys of wines submitted to wine shows. Internationally the cork industry has attempted to dismiss this as an Australian phenomenon, but without success. Yet Australian wine has achieved what it has over the last decade because of its attention to technical excellence, the very same attention it now religiously shows towards the purchase and application of its corks. Little wonder the cork industry regards Australia as the hardest nut to crack. I believe there is less incidence of cork taint today than five years ago, although this claim is purely anecdotal. By investing heavily in exhaustive and fastidious testing it is possible for wine companies to reduce their level of cork taint to around 2%, but the expense required to do this is far beyond the resources of small wineries. Part of the reduction in cork taint lies in the disuse of agglomerate corks, which in my experience cause virtually 100% taint if you are prepared to wait for long enough. There is a suggestion inherent from the cork producers in an article in Cape Mentelle’s newsletter by Paddy Kendler that Australian winemakers have only themselves to blame for buying poor quality cork, since they do not visit their suppliers in Portugal (and other Mediterranean countries) and do not know the names of the actual company their cork is purchased from. I believe that these details are relatively insignificant next to the extensive trialling before purchase undertaken by the larger and medium-sized companies, many of which know a great deal more about their cork than their suppliers would perhaps be aware. Furthermore, even those who go to extreme levels of testing prior to usage are accustomed to regularly returning shipments of cork back to Europe. Richard Gibson, who as Southcorp’s Group Technical Manager buys more cork than anyone else in Australia, says there are no great suppliers, only great batches. ‘We’ve visited the factories, and our staff are in Portugal and Spain every year. We’ve done everything to establish a relationship of trust with the suppliers. But there’s still no guarantee that the next batch will be ok. In the last fortnight we’ve seen four reject batches from a supplier with whom we’ve had no difficulties over the last six months. Of the 41 batches we tested last month, we rejected five, although that’s a little on the high side’, he said. ‘How much you reject today depends on how much you’re prepared to spend and what level of risk you’re prepared to carry.’ The Stelvin screw-top seal is an excellent seal for red and white table wines and although it is completely impervious to air (unless there is an imperfection or damage to the bottle), it does permit the maturation of wine in the bottle. I have tasted too many excellent mature bottles sealed in this fashion to believe otherwise. Like the Stelvin, cork should be an inert seal. The cork lobby would do well not to repeat its jaundiced argument that part of the magic of maturing wine is to experience the subtle differences from one bottle to another. Why somebody should invest so much expense, time and emotion to make a wine that can be affected by a pellet of oak bark is more than beyond me. Yet most people want the cork industry to succeed. Most in the wine industry are aware of its traditions and value their existence. Most buyers probably want a cork in the end of their bottle of wine. But everybody is entitled to a reliable seal. In many cases it’s costing the larger companies more to buy their new synthetic corks than the corks they have replaced them with. It’s early days for synthetic closures like Supremecorq and Integra and there’s no doubt that they will improve. A range of published data suggests that if they are not inert, at least they behave in a predictable and regular fashion. So no winemaker in his or her right mind should seal their premium wines destined for cellaring with synthetic closures, for it’s a role for which they are presently entirely unproven. But they would appear to be entirely satisfactory for wines made for consumption within a year of release. It’s simple to see why the cork industry is alarmed, for this equates to over 80% of all Australian wine. Since around 60% of the world’s cork resources are presently directed towards the wine industry, it’s also perfectly obvious (i) why the cork industry is throwing the punches and (ii) why people like Bill Gates are investing so heavily in synthetic closures. And since Australia is such an important and influential test market for this debate, it’s clear why the cork industry is investing so heavily in publicity in our corner of the world. Personally, I’m convinced that the cork industry would be better off directing its financial resources even further towards quality improvement than to public relations of the present flavour, which several key buyers consider to be simply insulting. And that’s not going to sell any more corks, is it?
