The Coonawarra: a viticultural frontier? Or just a case of sour grapes?

This paper discusses the definition of the Coonawarra Viticultural Region by the Geographical Indications Committee of the Australian Wine and Brandy Corporation. The paper focuses on the geographical elements, critiques the extended process that resulted in the determination, and provides some alternative suggestions based on geography.

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By 1990 about 400 viticultural regions were recognised in Australia. In the late 1980s the need for formal definition arose as a result of international treaty obligations connected with trade and intellectual property rights. From 1994 a committee set up by the Australian Wine and Brandy Corporation (AWBC) became responsible for the official delineation and definition of Australian viticultural regions. This was the Geographical Indications Committee (GIC). The committee of three worked within a framework of Regulations which were to give "geographical" guidance.

In 1997, the GIC presented an Interim Determination for the Coonawarra Region. Whereas most previous determinations had proceeded with few problems, the Coonawarra Determination was to cause great discontent and conflict and, arguably, has still not been satisfactorily resolved. It had become a "frontier of dissent".

BACKGROUND TO THE REGION

This area of South Australia is part of the Murray-Darling Basin, which has experienced a series of marine incursions over geological time and the consequent accumulation of great thicknesses of marine sediments including limestone (O'Driscoll, 1960). The sea began its most recent retreat from this area about a million years ago, leaving a series of fossil coastal sand dunes roughly parallel to the present coast (Sprigg, 1952, Blackburn et al, 1965) (Figure 1). Though locally called "ranges" the highest and most easterly of these, the East and West Naracoorte Ranges are only 50 to 60 metres above the plains to the west and 30 to 40 metres above the plains to the east. The relative elevation is a result of movement along the Kanawinka fault line (marked "KF") (O'Mara, 1957). Some 20km to the west of the Naracoorte Ranges is the Cave Range ("CR") which rises only 10 to 20 metres above the surrounding plain. The West Naracoorte Range is estimated to be between 720,000 and 770,000 years old and the Cave Range between 650,000 and 680,000 years (Drexel and Preiss, 1995). Between and roughly parallel to the Naracoorte and Cave Ranges lies a subdued elongated surface feature in the form of a low platform (not shown in this figure). This platform extends for approximately 20 to 25 kilometres north-south and is about 2.5 kilometres wide at its maximum. It stands 1 to 2 metres above the surrounding countryside. Its origin is uncertain but may represent the degraded and weathered calcrete core of a fossil dune.

[FIGURE 1 OMITTED]