Sour Grapes: Why Ireland’s new warnings for wine is making Italy see red

“Drinking alcohol causes liver disease” and “There is a direct link between alcohol and fatal cancers.” Ireland’s plan to have these two warnings displayed on all bottles of wine, beer and other spirits has become a source of sour grapes in Italy.

Italy’s government and wine producers’ associations have described the “terrifying” warnings as a “direct attack” against the country.

Will this decision by the Irish cause a diplomatic row? What’s the debate all about? We have the answers for you.

Ireland’s labelling decision

Ireland has decided to go ahead with putting a health warning on the label of beer, wine and spirits. The warnings will read as: “Drinking alcohol causes liver disease.”

“There is a direct link between alcohol and fatal cancers.”

And lastly, “Alcohol consumption during pregnancy carries risk for the foetus.” This will be illustrated by way of a symbol.

The announcement was made public after it passed the deadline for the European Commission to oppose it. In June last year, Dublin informed the Commission about its intention and did not receive any objection, from it during a six-month deadline period despite protests from producing countries including Italy and Spain.

Once officially implemented by the Irish government, the alcohol industry will have three years to implement the labelling on all spirit bottles. The move is allowed under Ireland’s draft Public Health Regulations 2022.

Earlier, the Department of Health’s ‘Healthy Ireland 2021’ survey showed 66 per cent of people have consumed alcohol in the previous six months, with those aged 15-24 (70 per cent) and men (68 per cent) most likely to do so. Furthermore, some 37 per cent of the population aged 15 and older drink alcohol at least once a week. This compares to 41 per cent in the previous survey in 2018.

A 2020 report by the Irish Business and Employers Confederation (IBEC) had said that wine remains the second favourite alcohol beverage with 32 per cent market share. It added that overall, wine sales in 2020 rose by 12 per cent to over 10 million cases. The report also revealed that Chilean wine remains the nation’s favourite, Spanish wine continues to grow in popularity with a 15.3 per cent share of the total wine market. Next came Australia with 13.8 per cent and French and Italian wines were fourth and fifth on the list.

‘Absurd decision’

However, Ireland’s labelling decision has angered Italian wine producers and the government too.

Coldiretti, Italy’s biggest farmers’ association, called the warnings “terrifying” and said that it was a “direct attack” against the country. “The green light from the European Union for alarmist wine labels in Ireland represents a dangerous precedent as it risks opening the door to other legislation capable of negatively influencing consumer choices,” the association said in a statement. “It is completely improper to equate the excessive consumption of spirits, typical of the Nordic countries, to the moderate and conscious consumption of quality products with lower alcohol content, such as beer and wine.”

Echoing similar sentiments, Luigi D’Eramo, an undersecretary at Italy’s agriculture, food sovereignty and forestry ministry, argued that wine and beer shouldn’t be compared to hard spirits.

He was quoted as telling The Guardian: “You don’t protect public health by criminalising individual products.”

“Wine is history, culture… an expression of our territories and is part of the Mediterranean diet. It is about quality and responsible consumption. The health warning plan is a dangerous precedent which, if followed by other countries, risks damaging a leading sector of our food and agriculture system,” he added.

Italy’s foreign affairs minister also waded into the spirited debate, tweeting, “Ireland’s decision to introduce a label for all alcoholic beverages, including Italian wine, is absurd.”

Assurda la decisione dell’Irlanda di introdurre un’etichetta per tutte le bevande alcoliche, incluso il vino italiano. Nonostante la contrarietà del PE. Scelta che ignora la differenza tra consumo moderato e l’abuso di alcol. Chiederò l’intervento della Commissione Ue sul @wto.

— Antonio Tajani (@Antonio_Tajani) January 12, 2023

Federvini, Italy’s federation of producers, exporters and importers of wines, called on the Italian government to take action “to oppose a rule that goes against common sense and reality”.

In a statement of the Federvini website, president Micaela Pallini described Ireland’s plan as “discriminatory and disproportionate” because “it does not distinguish between abuse and consumption”.

WHO’s warning on alcohol

But, Italy may want to heed what the World Health Organization (WHO) latest warning. On 4 January, the world health agency said that there is no safe amount of alcohol that does not affect health.

It noted that the latest data analysis revealed that half of all alcohol-attributable cancers in the WHO European Region are caused by “light” and “moderate” alcohol consumption — less than 1.5 litres of wine or less than 3.5 litres of beer or less than 450 millilitres of spirits per week.

“Alcohol causes at least seven types of cancer, including the most common cancer types, such as bowel cancer and female breast cancer. Ethanol (alcohol) causes cancer through biological mechanisms as the compound breaks down in the body, which means that any beverage containing alcohol, regardless of its price and quality, poses a risk of developing cancer,” WHO said.

It concluded, “We cannot talk about a so-called safe level of alcohol use. It doesn’t matter how much you drink — the risk to the drinker’s health starts from the first drop of any alcoholic beverage. The only thing that we can say for sure is that the more you drink, the more harmful it is – or, in other words, the less you drink, the safer it is.”

With inputs from agencies

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