Chataeu Maroc, Chateau Chine, Chateau Riyadh, Chateau Mullahs…….....
“But Fatima has never tasted wine - she says it is too expensive. Nor does she realise that her job is at the cutting edge of commercial moves to sell Moroccan wine to distant markets. Chateau Roslane, a sprawling property of more than 2,000 hectares (5,000 acres) belongs to the country's oldest winemaker and boasts Morocco's only Appellation d'Origine Controlee (AOC) - a French system which guarantees that wine has come from a specific geographical location. It also produces a Moroccan "champagne", a sparkling wine made according to the Champagne method and which is sold locally. But Fatima has never tasted wine - she says it is too expensive. Nor does she realise that her job is at the cutting edge of commercial moves to sell Moroccan wine to distant markets. Wine has been produced in Morocco for thousands of years, so it does not touch the raw nerve it would in Saudi Arabia, for example……… The first evidence of wine production in Morocco was in the time of the Phoenicians - the first millennium BC. Prized by the Romans, the strong wine was sent back to Italy. During the years of the protectorate in the early 20th Century, the French colonised the Meknes region in the foothills of the Atlas Mountains, planting hundreds of kilometres of vines…..…. "At the moment we are in negotiations in China and will shortly be building a bottling factory there. Most of our wine is exported in bulk," he explains. "With our Chinese partners we will put it in bottles that bear a Moroccan label." Currently only about 1,000 hectolitres are exported, but with a foothold in China, there is a chance that the record of almost 300m hectolitres clocked up during the French protectorate could be matched or even bettered. …....…..”
The part about a bottling factory in China should worry consumers of that stuff, as should any bottled and canned item that can be ingested and comes out of China.
Nice phrase “Wine has been produced in Morocco for thousands of years, so it does not touch the raw nerve it would in Saudi Arabia.”
Actually, wine was produced in the Arabian Peninsula (Hijaz and other parts), what is now Saudi Arabia, thousands of years ago as well. In fact I can assure you that wine is still being produced in Saudi Arabia, using excellent Austrian and French grape juices. In my own native country, the fun-dementa-lists tried to get the import of grape juices banned. I can also assure you that more wine is consumed in Saudi Arabia than what is locally produced.
Iran used to have a good wine industry as well before the Revolution of 1979. There is no legal wine industry in Iran now, but that does not mean they are not producing it and consuming it. Of course before the Revolution drugs, smuggled from Afghanistan and Pakistan, were not as widely used in the major cities.
Wine, I can say, is the one item after petroleum in which the countries of the Gulf are self-sufficient, samizdat-style, or can be.
Cheers
mhg
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