Increasingly buyers of Australian wine will see it marketed by region of origin and not multi-regional blends.

And to date there are 61 Australian regions of which the Barossa Valley is most well-known.

But one region to emerge as producing a few per cent of Australia’s best and 15 per cent of super-premium wine is Margaret River.

That position could not be clearer after digesting the results of their 2009 show held last November.

I am astounded by the gold strike. Never before in any Australian regional show has there been such a cluster of gold medals in the wine classes that matter.

That is: chardonnay, cabernet and cabernet blends. Two hero styles recognised internationally.

The 2007-2008 chardonnay class gave up 7 gold, 6 silver, of which Lenton Brae Wilyabrup 2007 (AUD 45) triumphed with top gold and best white of show.

Hot on its heels were Brookland Valley 2008, vasse Felix Heytesbury 2007, Stella Bella 2008, Devil’s Lair 2007, Brettenay Reserve 2008 and Cape Mentelle 2008.

Add to these the four big guns who do not exhibit a Margaret River chardonnay-Leeuwin, Pierro, Cullen (Vanya was a judge) and Moss Wood.

Their recent scores in Jeremy Oliver’s Australian Wine Annual were 93 (2006), 95 (2007), 94 (2007) and 95 (2007) respectively.

Given that the judges included some modern palates: Ben Edwards and Philip Rich (Melbourne) and Tony Harper (Brisbane) it is clear that many of Australia’s best chardonnays come from this region.

And the 2007 and 2008 harvests, vintage conditions and eventual outturn are positively outstanding. Margaret River avoided most of the heat dumped on the Eastern states during this pair of stellar years.

The next boomer of a class was 2007-2008 cabernet sauvignon. The result gave 10 golds, 9 silver-what a thumper of a result; 6-2007 and 4-2008, with Rosabrook 2007 (AUD 25) taking the gong for top gold in the class.

Remember that Fraser Gallop 2007 took a recent trophy in the UK, and they backed up with gold for 2008 also.

Equally important is the cabernet blend class-essentially cabernet blended with merlot.

This class gave 4 golds (2-2007 and 2-2008), 7 silver with Voyager Girt be the Sea 2007 (AUD 24) topping the class for the trophy.

The most intriguing result, not a judging aberration is best cabernet of show-the only gold from the more mature 2005-2006 class, Evans and Tate The Reserve 2006 (AUD 35) took the trophy.

Without demeaning all associated this is an outstanding outcome when 2006 was a disaster vintage in this region, and this company has made such a great wine.

One endearing aspect of Margaret River cabernet is that the good ones age well, develop a terrific backbone of tannin and keep their aromatic herbal overtones over time-hallmark cabernet and rarely disappointing.

Check out the show results-you may never see so many golds at one show again! http://www.margaretriverwine.org.au/documents/2009WineShowResults.pdf

During the past two months there have been reports by German authorities who have used new sophisticated systems to detect the mould inhibitor natamycin in Argentinian and South African wines.

Now this fungicide (also known as pimaricin) is not nasty stuff but it creates concern about what origin wine you’d prefer to drink in future.

Natamycin is registered for cheese products in both the EU and US (FDA approved in 1994) as a mould inhibitor in sliced cheese.

As is usual Australian wine scientists have been pro-active in seeking the nature and cause of these reports and the Australian Wine Research Institute came out on January 20 with some good advice.

“The recent detection of the fungicide natamycin in Argentinean wine sent to Germany serves as a cautionary reminder to all winemakers to be vigilant when purchasing and using additives and processing aids.”

Natamycin is a fungicide that can legally be used in Australia during cheese production and in the production of certain meat products.

It cannot be used in wine making in either Australia nor, we believe, in Argentina.

At the time of writing the origin of this material in some Argentinian wine has not been confirmed, but it has been suggested that oak chips, treated with this antimicrobial agent, might have been the source.

Details of the AWRIs analysis capability to detect natamycin in wine can be found on their website.

Also, with these contamination reports circulating the French cork manufacturer Oeneo was proactive to clear its name earlier this month.

However, the natural cork industry has been remarkably silent, showing its lack of proactivity (too busy falsely chirping about how taint levels have declined).

As a result of recent industry wide concern over the presence of natamycin in a number of South American and South African wines, closure manufacturer Oeneo has completed an extensive study into any possible relationship between its technical closure DIAM and natamycin.

The analysis, completed by leading UK laboratory Campden BRI, concluded that natamycin was not present, at any level, in any DIAM closure analysed.

Oeneo analysed some of the wines in question, and batches of ‘virgin’ DIAM for traces of natamycin. The results were negative for natamycin.

Commenting on the development, DIAM commercial director Dean Banister said: “The moment we were alerted to this issue we requested samples of DIAM closed wines from various winery partners to be analysed.

“There had been unsubstantiated rumours that natural and technical cork closures could be responsible for the levels of natamycin found in the banned South American and South African wines recently banned in Germany.

“Being proactive we have moved swiftly to reassure our customers that DIAM does not contain natamycin at any level.

“We do not use natamycin in the production of DIAM, and have received statements from our suppliers confirming that natamycin is not used at any stage within our tightly controlled supply chain.

“Even if it were present in a supplied raw material, the process used to produce DIAM would eradicate any possible natamycin contamination.”

It’s great news that modern wine guru Gary Vaynerchuk from New Jersey to come down to Australia next April.

This guy has revolutionised online wine retailing from his humble NJ wine shop by connecting with social networks.

All the content and the production have been Gary’s own design over the past five years, the most important being his video Wine Library TV; check it out www.garyvaynerchuk.com

Gary spoke late last year at a large media conference in Spain, and is being courted widely to attend wine conferences and express his secrets of success in receiving over 80,000 hits a day on his social networks.

Such as tweeting to @garyvee, which in US terms translates to a lot of wine sales.

His mission in Oz is to address a social media conference ConnectNow www.connectnow.net.au which runs for three days at Sydney University from April 7.

As part of the proceedings the Australian wine industry thru Wine Australia is running a competition to win an interview date with Gary Vaynerchuk while he is around.

He will also be adding content to his outgoing video clips in the famous Wine Library TV featuring Australian wine people (rather than just brands) which is the social network thing.

Aussies can enter the competition closing March 19 at www.wineaustralia.com and tweet @winehero.

Governments are responsible for bizarre taxation outcomes. In the case of the wine industry it is utterly reprehensible.

If Australia is a New World player in the international wine trade then it needs to give its domestic wine industry a healthy taxation base from which to prosper.

In 1950 Australia had a cottage wine industry but most of the wine made was fortified and there were only seven wineries in existence in Victoria. That meant high alcohol content stuff unsuitable in a modern wine society.

By the 1970s table wines had been introduced to the traditional British lunch table by migrants with their roots in southern European cultures. Many of these migrants made their own consumption wine and didn’t buy it from shops. Many of their descendants still make their own wine today-and quite drinkable at that.

At that time half the wine made in the country was fortified but that has dropped away as more grapes were planted for lighter table wine.

Originally this wine was not taxed: it was such a small industry yielding little potential income for the government while beer and spirits were the big earners. The tax eventually came as sales tax, and stood at a few per cent.

Now that has fast-forwarded to 2010 where the domestic industry is one of the most highly taxed wine sectors in the wine producing world at 29 per cent. That’s pretty dumb if governments wish it to be sustainable-which at the present moment it is not due to self-imposed overplanting.

The Henry tax review as reported last Sunday to be contemplating a new alcohol tax scale levied on alcohol thresholds at 3.5 per cent, 5 per cent, 7 per cent, 10 per cent, 15 per cent and 22 per cent. http://www.theage.com.au/national/tax-shakeup-to-hit-beer-wine-prices-20100116-mdj1.html

Clearly this is intended to include beer and RTDs at the lower alcohol end, table wine in the middle and fortified wine at the top end. Although it is done elsewhere Australian winemakers have never had a tax incentive to make wine lower in alcohol.

That could come as a reality now.

The wine industry has always successfully argued that changing to alcohol based taxation simply wipes out regional economies in the big wine producing regions along the Murray and Darling rivers where the majority of inexpensive wine is made and most likely to be punished by alcohol based wine taxation.

That argument is now being diluted by the excess production provided by these regions, led by the inspiration of the supermarket duopoly to sell wine at AUD 2.00 per bottle.

The health lobby is not happy with this pointing at cheap wine alcohol being a major contribution towards alcohol related health costs to the Australian community.

That is true when cheap wine is less expensive than mineral water, methylated spirits or coke on a litre basis.

However if this does come into play the Pure Food Act warrants amendments so that wine now with a minimum allowed alcohol of 8 per cent can be legally made with lower levels.