Matthew Chapple has fond memories of growing up on a vineyard in South Australia's Riverland, but this vintage is one he would like to forget.
He is among many growers dropping red grapes on the ground at harvest because the winery he sells to is paying more for less.
"If we deliver any more fruit than 14 tonnes to the hectare, then our price starts to go backwards," Mr Chapple said.
"It's pretty depressing … you do feel like you've failed your family and can't provide."
While some cooler climate wine regions are experiencing a shortage of grapes this vintage, wineries in the big producing warmer inland areas have too much red wine, especially shiraz and cabernet.
It is a glut largely caused by the loss of the China market, which imposed huge tariffs on Australian wine in 2020 after a diplomatic dispute that led to the collapse of a $1.2 billion market.
"The demand for Australian red wine just isn't there at the moment internationally," said Australian Grape & Wine chief executive Lee Mclean.
"We've seen some reasonably strong growth in areas like South-East Asia, but nothing that's going to replace that China market in the short term."
Growers exit wine industry
Martin Howie runs what was a highly regarded vineyard in the Riverland.
But when his contract with a winery expired at the same time as the China market collapsed, there was little demand for his grapes.
"I was ringing 20-odd wineries trying to find a home for the fruit. Unfortunately, it was just bad timing within the industry and I wasn't successful," Mr Howie said.
The recent drop in demand and prices, on top of what he says is a poor long-term average return for grapes, has convinced the grower to rip up all the vines and replace them with his other main crop, almonds.
"We've removed 45 hectares, which we are pushing up into piles and they'll be burnt," Mr Howie said.
"Going from a multi-crop business to a single crop business you know is a risk.
"But I just wasn't willing to sit around getting paid $100 or less per tonne for winegrapes."
Growers diversify to survive
Grower and winemaker Jim Markeas, who runs Mallee Estate at Renmark, lost 80 per cent of his business when the tariffs came in, with his tanks now full of red wine that was destined for China.
"It's more challenging than it's ever been before," he said.
"We've lost a significant trading partner, we've had a huge shipping disruption in the market to get product overseas, we've got high energy prices, we've got high inflation, the pressure is everywhere."
The downturn has prompted him to look for new ways to find customers.
Mr Markeas is converting his vineyards to organic, changing some varieties, installing a bottling plant to speed up delivery, and equipment to make spirits and low alcohol wines.
"Out of challenges comes opportunity, so we're grasping those opportunities by diversifying into new products," he said.
"If other people aren't investing in the future then they've got to look at their business model."
Downy mildew reduces vintage
But as anyone in agriculture knows, sometimes Mother Nature messes with that business model.
Heavy rain has taken a big toll with downy mildew dramatically reducing yields in inland regions.
"This is one of our chardonnay patches that got hit with downy mildew fairly hard," Mr Markeas said.
"It's probably down on a normal year by 80 per cent. Overall we would say we're 40 per cent down on a normal year."
But while the financial losses are significant, in a region drowning in red wine, there is an upside.
"It's a really challenging thing for any business to have to deal with the kinds of reductions in vintage that we're likely to see this year," Lee McLean said.
"But having said that, if you are ever going to have a situation where you're going to have a lower vintage, then this is probably the year to do it."
Premium wine regions not immune
While the impact of the oversupply is being felt most acutely in the inland regions that produce the bulk of Australia's commercial wine, premium shiraz growing regions, including South Australia's Barossa Valley, are not immune.
"There's a lot of wineries out there who just don't have the capacity to be buying the fruit at the same prices or volumes that they had in the past," Mr McLean said.
But that has also led to opportunities for smaller winemakers like Josh Pfeiffer to get his hands on a bigger selection of quality fruit and experiment more with it to meet changing consumer trends.
"It's been good for me. I've been able to pick up small parcels of fruit from growers who I haven't taken fruit from before," he said.
"We're seeking other ways of making wine and one of those is non-alcoholic wine. It's probably accounting for about 50 per cent of our total production this year."
Will China's return fix the glut?
As this year's very late and largely challenging vintage winds down, there is also a sense of optimism that the biggest fan of Australian red wine could soon be returning to the table.
China and Australia recently reached an agreement to work towards resolving a barley trade dispute, with wine likely to be next.
"Even if China comes back tomorrow we're not going to go back to a $1.2 billion market quickly or even in the medium term," Mr McLean said.
"We can't rely on it as a silver bullet to solve some of the problems we've got now.
Mr Chapple said that if the China market reopened this year, he hoped to "start processing through some of that surplus and getting it out of the wine tanks ready for next year".
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