How can a wine be termed ethical?
We use the term ethical to mean environmentally and socially responsible. Each wine we list ticks at least one of our ethical criteria. Ultimately what we want are wines that abide by both these sets of principles. It is a complex area which involves a lot of shades of grey rather than black and white. There are questions about how fair is Fairtrade (see below), questions around the permitted use of copper sulphate in organic vineyards, food miles, carbon footprints etc. In the end we make our own value judgement about each wine. What we are looking for are the growers’ best endeavours to do the right things for the soil, the quality of the wine, and the people who work the land. We look for people who care about how they do things and we find that this translates into the quality of the wine they produce.
