In this climategenn episode, I am speaking with journalist-and-author, Andy Neather, about his new book: Rooted In Change – The Stories Behind Sustainable Wine, co authored with Master of Wine, Jane Masters. The authors set out to document the challenges facing all aspects of wine production from the vineyard to the glass.

Order 'Rooted In Change'

Wine makes up an estimated 0.3% of agriculture globally and yet despite this tiny proportion, it is a beverage that humans have been making for thousands of years– serving sometimes with food, or as a ceremonial drink, or, in times more extreme, as a source of calories for French soldiers in the 1st World War trenches.

Today vineyard around the world– from France to Australia or Chile to China– are at risk from worsening impacts of climate change – in that sense, this 0.3% of agriculture is as vulnerable as much of the other 99.7% of agriculture that underpins our global food supply. As Professor Paul Behrens said in the previous episode, 30-40% of inflation on food in the UK is due to climate change.

A decade ago in Champagne, a wine producer told me harvest dates shifted forward in the late 1980s due to warming. Polar researchers I'd interviewed earlier noted Arctic sea ice decline accelerated in the same decade. Both independent observations confirmed the same reality: our world is heating up.

This new book, Rooted In Change, gives us a glimpse of the global response of the wine industry to save it self while acting responsibly as stewards of both land and atmosphere.

In this climategenn episode I am speaking with Professor Paul Behrens, British Academy Global Professor, at the Oxford Martin School, at the University of Oxford, UK. “If we continue on the way we’re going, we just have less and less resiliency in the system, less and less ability to roll with the punches of climate change.”Paul is the keynote speaker at the Sustainability In Drinks conference being held in London on the 21st October, where he will highlighting the incredibly fragile state of food production and supply. This fragility is being exacerbated by climate change.https://sustainabilityindrinks.com/“Some research suggests that food prices will increase between one and three percentage points, so an extra one to three percent per year by 2035, based on climate impacts. Now, the thing you've got to remember on the modelling on this is it's very hard, extremely hard, to model all the different impacts on the food system. In general, when I look at a model or an outcome of the model, I typically think that it's probably going to be a little bit worse than what you read.”Here we discuss the changes urgently required to help us navigate a more resilient pathway to the future. Aside from the Sustainability In Drinks conference on the 21st October, Paul is also part of a broader presentation being given at Westminster Hall in London on 27th November. This National Emergency Briefing on climate change will be given to MP’s, as well as other government officials and business leaders. Please check the link below:https://www.nebriefing.org/In the next episode I speak with author Andy Neather about his newly published book ROOTED IN CHANGE – The Stories Behind Sustainable Wine, coauthored with Jane Masters, Master of Wine. Available to order from the Academie du Vin Library.Thank you to all listeners commenters and members. There are many more episodes being recorded so please do subscribe to stay up to date.