Does foliar fertilization with Seaweed improve the productivity and quality of ‘Merlot’ grape must?

Italy is the leader table grape producer country in Europe and the eighth worldwide (OIV, 2021). The italian production area is sized at approximately 47,248 hectares with a production of 9.66 million quintals of grapes. Apulia and sicily are the main producing italian regions which collectively account for over the 90% of the italian production area (istat, 2022).

There is a high demand in the wine industry for analytical methods able to provide useful information to support the decision-making process in the vineyard and in the winery. Ideally these methods should be rapid (e.g.

Ce document présente la situation viticole des appellations d’origine en Argentine, Brésil, Chili et Uruguay.
L’étude s’est restreinte uniquement à ces 4 pays, bien qu’il en existe d’autres avec une production viticole d’une certaine importance.

Viticulture is threatened by the environmental modification caused by climate change. Higher temperatures determine an acceleration of the ripening process, which can be detrimental to wine quality. In the mediterranean area, heat waves are also increasingly frequent, with consequent blocking of the vegetative activity of the vines and increased susceptibility to sunburn damage. thus, adaptation strategies are necessary to reduce stress and improve the quality of grape production. Amongst the various techniques available, shading nets represent an interesting alternative for their effects on canopy microclimate (i.e., reduction of photosynthetic activity, improvement of water use efficiency, and slowing down in the ripening process).

The biodiversity of cultivated vines has been significantly reduced due to a series of factors that have favoured the cultivation of a limited number of varieties and clones over time. In veneto, since 1980, a series of important actions have been implemented to counter this process. These actions have focused on the conservation of germplasm identified in the territory and the recovery of varieties historically present in the region, which were in danger of being abandoned and disappearing.