The Wine PEF Pilot launches a first stakeholder consultation for defining the Environmental Footprint of Wines

Created under the umbrella of the European Commission’s Product Environmental Footprint initiative (PEF), the “Wine PEF Pilot” project aims at shaping harmonized methodologies and consistent solutions for voluntary footprint measurement and communication of environmental performance of wines. This will ensure a consistent applicability all across Europe and beyond, and make life easier for wine companies, - who will not need to apply different methodologies to test their own wine’s environmental footprint-. It will contribute to build trust for wine consumers and business partners in the supply chain. The rules to measure the environmental performance of wine products will be developed in a transparent and participative way. The first consultation on the Scope and Representative Product has now been launched. Interested stakeholders may get involved in the development of the pilots, thus participating in consultations and delivering comments, by subscribing to the virtual consultation forum “Stakeholder Workspace” created on the European Commission’s Environmental Footprint wiki. The outcomes from the pilot phase will be intended to become the specific PEF rules to be used by all stakeholders in the sector in the EU or even internationally who voluntarily decide to measure the environmental performance of their products. Following an in-depth evaluation of the results of the pilots the European Commission may decide on further policy applications. Wine companies, associations and other relevant stakeholders in the wine value chain willing to join the ‘Wine PEF Pilot’ are invited to express their interest to [email protected]

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About the Wine PEF Pilot project:

The Wine PEF Pilot project partners are:

• • Comité Européen des Entreprises Vins (CEEV)  - Coordinator
  • Pernod Ricard Winemakers Spain
  • Comité Interprofessionnel du Vin de Champagne (CIVC) &  three Champagne companies
  • Unione Italiana Vini (UIV)
  • Soc. Agricola Salcheto
  • The European Container Glass Federation (FEVE)
  • The European Cork association (CELiège)
  • Amcor
  • Nomacorc
  • Andalusian Institute of Technology (IAT)
  • UNESCO Chair in Life Cycle & Climate Change (ESCI-UPF)

These partners participate at the Technical Secretariat (TS) of the Wine PEF Pilot and collaborate for the definition of EU methodologies and information solutions that are appropriate and adapted for measuring and communicating wine environmental performance. The coordinator of the project’s TS is the Comité Européen des Entreprises Vins (CEEV - www.ceev.eu) who represents the wine companies in the European Union. It brings together 24 national organisations. With more than 7.000 companies, mainly SMEs, and more than 200.000 direct jobs in the EU, its members produce and market the vast majority of quality European wines, with and without a geographical indication, and account for over 90% of European wine exports. With around 8,8 billion € worth of exports every year, the wine sector makes a contribution of over 6 billion € to the EU trade balance. In the area of environmental sustainability, CEEV aims at promoting initiatives that contribute to the improvement of the environmental performance of competitive EU Wines and sector by preserving its natural assets and improving environmental sustainable viti-viniculture practices, preventing disproportionate burdens, barriers to trade and distortions of competition, and boosting the competitiveness of a responsible and sustainable wine sector.