South Africa's wild fires under control as wineries assess damage to vines

By Erin Smith

Published: 06 March, 2015

Cape Town, South Africa, which has been battling some of the worst wild fires the country has seen in over a decade, has now seen the blaze brought under control and wine authorities are starting to assess any potential vineyard damage.

South Africa Wild FiresSouth African wine estates are now in an assessment and recovery mode following the worst wild fires near Cape Town in over a decade.

Siobhan Thompson, the chief executive of Wine of South Africa, told Harpers.co.uk: "Owners and winemakers were engrossed in fighting the fires until early yesterday morning [and] so are very much in a recovery and assessment period now."

She said the most effected areas include Noordhoek and Constantia Valley.

"Cape Point Vineyard in Noordhoek and a number of wineries in the Constantia Valley have been impacted by fire damage, at this stage we are still awaiting a full assessment but the fires have been extinguished and are no longer threatening the vineyards. Both Cape Point and Buitenverwachting have reported a small amount of damage to vineyards but we are not expecting to hear of major losses to other estates," said Thompson.

Most of damage according to Thompson has been residential properties. "Most of the reported damage so far has been to residential properties in Noordhoek and Tokai and one Luxury Lodge on Chapman's Peak Drive," she said.

Fortunately the threat of smoke taint to this year's harvest is minimal since the harvest started this year unusually early. Some estates had reported having the earliest harvest this century, which has helped mitigate the exposure of the grapes to smoke as most estates have already finished picking fruit.

Thompson said: "As the harvest in South Africa started unusually early in 2015, we are fortunate that much of the picking had been completed when the fires began, which should limit any taint following the fires. Individual producers may have to take a call on the quality of their grapes, following exposure to smoke."

As South African wine estates begin recovery efforts Thompson is reassured that the 2015 harvest will be back on track shortly.

"South Africans are resilient and we expect all businesses to be focused on completing harvest and getting things back on track as swiftly as possible," she said.

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