Avag Harutyunyan, the president of the Union of Armenian Wine Producers and the founding director of Maran Company, expressed a concern during a conversation with www.aravot.am that Georgian wine would enter the Russian market soon, and we would be doing badly: “We will be doing badly in the sense that Azerbaijan is becoming active in the Russian market. Serious investments, qualitative changes are currently being made in Azerbaijan. As for lifting the Russian embargo, it has had quite a positive effect on the Georgian winemaking. It seemed that they would crash, but only the part that was intended for the Russian market alone and was faked crashed. Georgians turned to Europe and tried to fit in with the European system of values and standards. It led to substantially increasing the quality of Georgian wine; Georgians have ‘crystallized’ creating a strong and solid industry.” www.aravot.am inquired whether Azerbaijan had also participated in the International Wine and Spirits Competition in Moscow on November 20-22 organized by the International Organization of Vine and Wine (Paris). Let us remind that Maran Bagratuni 2010 was awarded the gold medal by a representative jury from among hundreds of wines.
“Azerbaijani wine is not of that high a quality to compete with us, but in the Russian market not quality, but presentation of the wine matters, and Azerbaijan doesn’t spare money to create an image, to insult the neighbors or to distort the history of wine and viniculture. We have hundreds of grape varieties that have been misattributed to Azerbaijan – the history of the Azerbaijani winemaking is the history of the Armenian winemaking. Up until 1988, all wineries and vineyards in Azerbaijan were of Armenian origin, and the wine grape varieties were exceptionally Armenian or were classified varieties created by Armenian farmer.”
Coming back to Armenia’s victory at the reputed exhibition, Mr. Harutyunyan added that Maran Bagratuni 2010 attracted the jury not only by its quality, but also by its taste and smell: “We got it by mixing Armenian Khatunkharji and French Aligote. The jury recognized the French type and was surprised that Aligote gained different qualities in Armenia. In the
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French or German Aligotes, valley and Alpine flowers dominate, whereas in our Aligote, flowers are still active, but the smell of honey, ripe melon and pineapple is added to that.”
Being a member of the International Organization of Wine and Vine, Georgia didn’t participate in the competition probably because of the problem with sending samples to Russia.
Avag Harutyunyan asserts: “Armenia is traditionally the home of red wine; we have always failed to produce good white wine, because 99 percent of our white wine has been used to produce brandy, raw materials and technologies have never been adequate to produce good white wine. Armenia suddenly presents a white wine at a competition, and it wins the gold medal. I am proud of Armenia.”
Gohar HAKOBYAN
