South Africa

South Africa is somewhere between a “new world” an “old world” country, for despite a winemaking legacy that originated in Constantia in the late 1600s, what is considered now as the birth of the modern era began in 1994 at the end of apartheid and the country’s re-emergence at an international level. Well-established wine estates such as Kanonkop, Meerlust, Vergelegen, Rustenberg, Boschendal, Hamilton Russell, Klein Constantia, Rust en Vrede and others were reinvigorated and set the tone for the new, outward looking wine industry, building more established, consistent brands that became reasonably successful. Unfortunately, that did little to stem the tide of the newly tradeable, poor-quality bulk wine from virus-ridden vineyards that was still to mark South Africa’s card for at least the next decade. Ultimately, the political and economic freedoms of the new South Africa would not herald the rebirth of a truly great wine industry for a few years yet. For in the post-apartheid decade, it’s fair to say that priorities, naturally, laid more in building improved legal and political infrastructures, curbing entrenched racial and economic inequality, and refining the country’s reputation on the world stage; issues that endure to this day and that no other serious wine producing country needs to face up to in quite the same way.