Tunisia’s blisteringly hot summer has hit Tunisia’s small wine industry, damaging or destroying grapes and leaving farmers and vintners to fear for their future as extreme weather brings hotter, drier weather to North Africa.
Estimates of how far wine output has fallen vary, from a roughly 20% drop according to the Agriculture Ministry’s Kilani Belhaj, to a reduction of 40-50% according to Vineyard Producers’ Syndicate head Salim Chaouch.
Winemakers in France and elsewhere in southern Europe have also warned of lower wine output this year due to the heat.
Farmer Wajdi Graya said his own production had fallen by between two fifths and three fifths this year after July temperature highs of between 38-48 Celsius as the heat reduced sugar levels in his grapes.
In ancient times Tunisia was a major wine producer under the Carthaginian and Roman empires and commercial-scale output began again under French colonialism, though it has not become a significant exporter.
However, Tunisian supermarkets stock a wide selection of locally made wines, many of them from the fertile northern hills near the base of the Cap Bon peninsula.
The grapes are picked early in the morning and driven to a modern processing facility at Takelsa in central Tunisia to be turned into wine.
At Coteaux Takelsa company, which produces wine from grapes grown by Graya and about 160 other farmers, director Hammadi Brik said he was rescheduling farmers’ debts and altering grape specifications to help them manage.
