The ethical drinker Labour of love? Not aalways

The romantic idea that wine is a labour of love can veil the truth that many of those involved in the backbreaking tending of vineyards live a life far removed from any romance.

- Ines Salpico, Decanter Regional Editor for Spain, Portugal & South America

Often displaced, navigating grey zones of immigration and settlement laws, and juggling a succession of disparate seasonal farming work – in countries whose local language and labour laws they do not understand – they form the huge, international and most vulnerable community that puts so much of our foodstuff on supermarket shelves.

Against a backdrop of inflation, rising production costs and severely strained world supply chains – not to mention the fractious state of global politics – those upon whom producers rely to grow and harvest their grapes can easily become the weakest link. That much has become starkly apparent in recent weeks in the US, as government Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids and deportation policies have begun to be forcibly enacted (Ana Carolina Quintela’s 17 June dispatch from California on decanter.com, ‘California’s wine communities face deeply human costs’, is compulsory reading).

Collective urge to act