Wine in PIedont and the rest of Italy: situation today during Covid-19

The "Covid-19 crisis" is global. Activities in the cantina and in rural areas have to continue (with all the costs this entails), the stopping of the catering industry is becoming increasingly important, not only in Italy (where Fipe's latest hypotheses speak of a loss of 30 billion euros at the end of the year, ed.), but in many of the main wine markets from the US to the UK, from France to Germany, to China (which, slowly, it seems, is starting again).

All countries are thinking about "Phase 2" at different times and in different ways, but in each country, catering and social gathering activities will generally be among the last to start again, at least for consumption "in loco" (while in many countries, unlike Italy, take-away activities are allowed for everyone.

But also the strong slowdown of the tourism industry, which also has a strong impact on the many investments for the reception in the basement over the years, the restrictions on free movement in general: all this will unfortunately take until, in fact, beyond the primary and necessary reduction of infections, a cure comes which means a vaccine that, according to sources, we will have to wait another 12 months. 

The wine fields in Italy and in the rest of the world will face a drop in sales of 30-70% by 2020. Higher for small and medium sized wineries. But even those who make more significant volumes will suffer, with the increase in sales recorded so far in the basic gdo channel, and also in e-commerce, which however, at least in Italy, starts with very low numbers, which does not compensate for the decline in consumption in the hospitality sector.

 This is a problem for all producer countries, as is shown, for example, by the US estimate: according to an initial study by the "Wine Institute", losses for US wine domains could be in the region of $6 billion. A figure, on what is today the most important wine market in the world, that says a lot about the impact of the Coronavirus crisis on the sector.

In the Italian market in particular, the liquidity crisis caused by the lack of revenue in that period, which many people stress, will be exacerbated by the abuse of late payments and bankruptcies on invoices that were already old before the arrival of the crisis. And last but not least, we will have to take into account a global flow of tourists that, for a period that promises not to be short, will certainly be a long way from what we were used to. With all that, of course, and that follows, in terms of consumption, economy and employment. An image in increasingly bleak colours, which is worth repeating. Because the responses of the Italian and European institutions so far do not seem to match the seriousness of the situation, both in terms of economic size and in terms of access.