There is no love for politicians among the winemakers of the Languedoc-Roussillon. But in the vast stretch of vineyard that covers the south of France from the Rhône in the east down to the Spanish border, protest and dissent are as much a part of life as pétanque and vin rouge.
It’s a sentiment with a long tradition. Just over a century ago, in the spring and early summer of 1907, the Midi’s wine industry was at the centre of one of the most violent eruptions of civil unrest in the country’s modern history, as angry crowds in the hundreds of thousands brought the region to a standstill, battling with the army and railing against what they saw as neglect from Paris after sales of local wine had collapsed in the face of competition from Algeria and adulterated wines from elsewhere in France.
The five people who died during the rioting and street fighting of 1907 are part of the mythology of the most controversial contemporary incarnation of the Midi vigneron rebel spirit, the militant group Comité Régional d’Action Viticole. This secretive alliance of disenfranchised wine producers has been active since the 1960s, carrying out sporadic attacks on political offices, supermarkets and wine producers ever since.
In the past year, however, the attacks have become more frequent, with the group claiming responsibility for – among other acts of protest, arson and sabotage – ransacking and burning the offices of local bulk wine supplier Sudvin; emptying vats at another distributor, Biron, in the Languedoc fishing port of Sète; and dumping 25,000 litres of Spanish wine in a supermarket car park. According to French wine trade website Vitisphere, last month the group was planning an even larger attack, this time on several bulk wine distributors in Bordeaux, before being intercepted on the motorway between Toulouse and Bordeaux by police.
The wider wine trade, not least in Britain, has a tendency to dismiss these balaclava-clad rebels as posturing, dangerous dinosaurs, with a set of impossible-to-meet demands. But their actions are rooted in a form of desperation with which it’s hard not to feel some sympathy – and which is widely shared in a region where a protest march drew thousands of winemakers to the streets of Narbonne earlier this year.
Right now, the main target of the anger of peaceful protesters and self-styled vinous terrorists alike is the Spanish bulk wine industry, where lower production costs (including lower tax and social insurance contributions for employers) make it much easier to turn a profit from wine’s cheapest end. The result, the rebels say, is a flood of cheap Spanish imports on French supermarket shelves with little indication of their origin, and at considerably lower prices than producers in Languedoc-Roussillon can compete with.
If there’s a measure of anti-globalist rage to all this (and to the threats to block a stage of the Tour de France through the region last year over its links to Chilean wine brand Cono Sur), the roots of the current southern crise viticole go much deeper. Simply put, too many vignerons in the Midi have never come fully to terms with the dramatic changes in wine consumption of the past 50 years, changes which have seen fewer French people drink wine, and those that do drinking considerably less (a fall from 160 litres per head annually in the 1960s to more like 50 litres now) and of much better quality than the traditional Midi co-op could provide. At the same time, the rise of New World wine has made export markets such as the UK more competitive, while the flow of EU emergency subsidies for struggling vignerons has all but dried up since reforms around the turn of the decade.
The solution of the latest politician to alienate the Midi’s winemakers – the president-cum-CEO Emmanuel Macron – would be for winemakers to “think and act more like a start-up”, tailoring their product to modern tastes and needs. And in fact, Languedoc-Roussillon already has such producers.
Some, such as Jean-Claude Mas and ex-international rugby player Gérard Bertrand, take advantage of the looser winemaking laws of the region-wide IGP Pays d’Oc appellation to make excellent value wines from grapes sourced from growers throughout the region. Others, often the sons or daughters of growers who once sold their stock to co-operatives, have followed the example of trailblazers such as the Guibert family of Mas de Daumas Gassac in Aniane in the Languedoc or Gérard Gauby of Le Soula in Calce in the Roussillon, making genuinely fine, terroir-driven wines.
As good and exciting as these wines are, however, there are only so many drinkers in France and elsewhere prepared to buy them. And in a region where wine is still the main source of work, and unemployment in some departements touches 20%, the rage that drives CRAV and other protesters is unlikely to go away any time soon.
Six of the best from Laungedoc-Roussillon
Jean Claude Mas French Estate Organic White Blend, IGP Pays d’Oc, France 2016 (£6.99, Aldi)
Jean-Claude Mas is astonishingly prolific, making a huge range of affordable wines that always deliver on fruit and character. This fruit-salad of a dry white brings a hit of stone fruit ripeness balanced with fresh floral notes: a great summer party wine.
Gérard Bertrand Minervois, France 2015 (£7.49 until 12 Aug, then £9.99, Waitrose)
Ex-international rugby player Gérard Bertrand’s Languedoc empire is one of the most consistent in the Languedoc-Roussillon, and this red from the Languedoc appellation Minervois is just brilliant value on the offer price, all rippling brambly fruit and spice.
Domaine Gayda Syrah, IGP Pays d’Oc, France 2015 (from £9.95, slurp.co.uk; cambridgewine.com; hhandc.co.uk; harperwells.com)
From an ever-reliable modern Languedoc domaine, this is again magnificent value for a syrah of real purity that matches pricier northern Rhône versions of the grape for floral brightness, supple red and black fruit and pepper-spiced meatiness.
Domaine La Toupie Petit Salto Blanc, Côtes du Roussillon, France 2015 (£11.50, joiedevin.co.uk)
Roussillon’s reputation for wine may be built on its facility with big-boned, structured reds, but its whites can be brilliantly original and food-friendly. Made from grenache gris with a dash of macabeo, this one mixes fleshy peach with appetising chalky textue and salty minerals.
Domaine d’Auphillac Montpeyroux Rouge, France 2014 (from £20, josephbarneswines.com; lescaves.co.uk; handford.net)
The Fadat family domaine sits across the river Hérault from the fabled Languedoc fine-wine pioneer Mas de Daumas Gassac, and its wines are every bit as rewarding and evocative: herby, darkly fruited, layered but pulsing with energy and salty liquorice.
Domaine La Tour Vieille La Pinède, Collioure, France 2015 (£16.50, yapp.co.uk)
In a coastal part of Roussillon with a grand tradition of making sweet fortified wines, Domaine La Tour Vieille has adapted impressively to the modern appetite for dry reds and whites, making fragrant but deep reds with a whiff of the sea and gorgeous ripe berry fruit such as this.
