Assessment of environmental sustainability of wine growing activity in France

To meet the demand of assessment tool of vine growers and their advisers we adapted to the vine production the INDIGO® method to developed initially for arable farming. This article aims to assess the feasibility and the robustness of the INDIGO® Indicators multi-criteria method of environmental assessment.
INDIGO® indicators of sustainability were built based on different aggregation methods of winegrowers practices and field characteristics. Indicators were tested in Alsace, Champagne, Burgundy, Jura vineyards for northern climate and four vintages (2000, 2001, 2002 and 2003) and Loire Valley vineyards for oceanic climate for 2008 vintage. Four viti-ecological indicators -I-pesticide, I-energy, I-nitrogen and I-organic-matter – were adapted from arable farming. And two viti-ecological indicators – I-soil-cover and I-frost– were created for vineyards. The six indicators were tested in Northern French vineyards and three of them -I-pesticide, I-energy and I-soil-cover- were adapted to oceanic conditions of vineyard production and calculated with 2008 data. INDIGO® viti-ecological indicators were successfully tested in several French vineyards illustrated the large variations between vineyards in rain intensity, fungi attack and winegrowers practices. The results leads us to that these INDIGO® viti-ecological indicators are robust and can be used in all vineyards.