An overview of the winery’s sustainability concept and practices.
Cantine Europa has embarked on the path of sustainability, considering it fundamental to its future development. Since 17 October 2016, together with the University of Palermo and the Biopek Snc dairy in Gibellina, it has launched the three-year project ‘Integrated approach for the development of innovative products in the leading sectors of the Sicilian agri-food industry’, financed by the Horizon 2020 Programme with the aim of improving the safety and quality of food products and fostering the development of sustainable and competitive bio-industries.
As part of this project not only of sustainability but also of circular economy, Cantine Europa produces organic wines and sparkling wines from Grillo grapes, with a reduced use of oenological adjuvants and with an innovative management of selected indigenous yeasts and noble lees to extend the technological longevity of the bottled product. Proof of this is Grillante: its production takes place with a reduced use of oenological adjuvants, is traceable and long-lived. Furthermore, through the waste products of the entire wine production chain (distilled marc and pruning waste) a high quality compost for agronomic use in an organic regime has been created. The compost, in fact, is used both for wine production and for the production of cheeses enriched with natural nutraceutical substances (phenolic extracts from wine by-products) that are also authentic and traceable. The project, therefore, with an integrated approach in the fields of agronomy, viticulture, plant pathology, microbiology, oenological chemistry and agri-food economics, has seen
- the identification of biotypes and areas planted with organic Grillo grapes characterised by the best phytosanitary and technological quality, through a process of soil zoning, in order to produce traceable organic and sparkling wines with high longevity
- the definition of the best technological and oenological conditions for the stabilisation of organic white wines, produced both in the absence and with a reduced use of oenological adjuvants, leading to high quality, greater longevity and higher health value of the wine;
- the creation of a composting system for wine industry by-products capable of reducing management costs and environmental problems related to the disposal of wine and wine-making waste;
- the development of a protocol for extracting phenols from grape marc for use in the dairy sector to obtain products with high nutraceutical value;
- the creation of a system of territorial traceability and authentication of raw materials and finished products on a chemical and genotypic basis.
Cantine Europa thus had the opportunity to diversify the company’s offer through the production of organic wines made with innovative systems, obtained by implementing economically sustainable processes with the reduction and/or elimination of oenological adjuvants during the main vinification phases and the increase in technological longevity thanks to natural phenolic-anthocyanic and protein stabilisation.
Strategic, in this context, is the creation of an objective traceability and authentication system, with a focus on safety and verification of the origin and authenticity of the raw material used for processing.
Finally, the winery has developed, again in collaboration with the University of Palermo, a new research path with a focus on the agri-food system based on the Carbon Footprint and Water Footprint.