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December 2015 WINES&VINES 19 WINE INDUSTRY NEWS M ilan, Italy—While many in the wine industry are still trying to educate consumers about what it means for a winery or vineyard to be sus- tainable, experts gathered during the opening day of the SIMEI con- ference in Milan to pinpoint the sensory characteristics of sustain- able wines and winemaking. Organized by the group Unione Italiana Vini (UIV), which is com- prised of wineries, vineyards and winemaking equipment suppliers, SIMEI is held every two years in a sprawling exposition center out- side the city of Milan. Thousands of attendees are drawn to the event, which includes a trade show featuring hundreds of sup- pliers that set up booths in four huge exhibition halls. During the most recent SIMEI conference in 2013, the "Interna- tional Congress" discussed how to best balance the environmental, social and economic pillars of sus- tainability as well as "harmonize" the various public and private ef- forts seeking to incorporate the strategy into winemaking. This year, the goal of the two- day conference was to further de- fine sustainability as well as the sensory characteristics of a sus- tainable wine. As Domenico Zonin, president of the UIV, said in a speech to open the conference, the topic of sustainability is often discussed without taking into account the need to ensure wine quality as well as produce something that con- sumers will purchase and enjoy. Extension special- ist Anita Oberholster from the University of California, Davis, was a co-chair of the committee develop- ing the conference along with Ulrich Fis cher from the Center for Wine Research DLR Rheinpfalz (Germany). Fischer said sensory analysis bridges the gap between wine- making and consumers by deter- mining what consumers find appealing in a wine. If a wine is produced using sustainable vine- yard and cellar methods but goes unsold, it's not sustainable be- cause it provides no economic value to support those vineyard and winemaking practices. The industry has the technol- ogy to match winemaking to con- sumer preferences, Fischer said. For example, in light of concerns about alcohol levels, wineries can produce less sugar in the vineyard, manage a fermentation to pro- duce less alcohol in the cellar or remove a portion of the alcohol post-fermentation. The challenge, however, is to find the balance between altering a wine to meet consumer preferences and taking steps that are not sustainable. The SIMEI conference also honored four winemaking equip- ment suppliers with innovation awards and 17 with new technol- ogy awards. All of the winners will be covered in greater detail in a report from the UIV journal Il Cor- riere Vinicolo that will be pub- l i s h e d i n t h e J a n u a r y i s s u e of Wines & Vines. —Andrew Adams Sustainability Takes Center Stage at SIMEI Wine Show The giant SIMEI trade show takes place every two years in Milan, Italy.