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Organic Viticulture
Organic viticulture: an Australian manual | Revision history | Contacts
Introduction
What is organic viticulture?
Organic viticulture is about producing grapes using a “management system which promotes and enhances agro-ecosystem health, including biodiversity, biological cycles, and soil biological activity. It emphasises the use of management practices in preference to the use of off-farm inputs, taking into account that regional conditions require locally adapted systems” (adapted from the International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements).
Organic grape growing involves the development and maintenance of sustainable vineyard systems that rely to the greatest extent possible upon natural processes for nutrient cycling and pest, disease and weed management. Organic standards allow for a limited range of acceptable inputs such as fertilisers and pesticides to be used on the organic vineyard when necessary. | |
Why adopt organic methods?
Australian grape growers adopt organic methods because of the advantages they perceive in grape and wine quality, marketing, personal health and safety, and agricultural and environmental sustainability. Some growers take the issue of terroir particularly seriously and consider that reliance upon natural processes allows the full expression of local soil and other environmental characteristics in a wine.
Organic Viticulture: An Australian Manual
To assist grape growers who are interested in managing their vineyards organically, and to support further development of the organic viticulture industry, the Grape and Wine Research and Development Corporation and DPI jointly funded a project to document organic management practices for Australian grape growers.
The major output of that project is the publication Organic viticulture: an Australian manual. This manual will be of use to anyone interested in growing grapes organically, and to those who just wish to try selected aspects of the organic approach.
The manual may be downloaded free from this page as Adobe PDF files. It is also available in hard-copy and on CD-ROM (see Contacts below). The hard-copy and CD-ROM versions are priced to cover production costs.
To view the PDF documents you will need a copy of the Adobe Acrobat Reader. The reader can be downloaded free from Adobe Acrobat (external link).
| 1: Contents & Introduction |
(PDF 235kb)
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| 2: Principles, Standards & Inputs |
(PDF 195kb)
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| 3: Establishment & Conversion |
(PDF 220kb)
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| 4: Environment & Landscape |
(PDF 72kb)
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| 5: Soil Management |
(PDF 818kb)
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| 6: Water Management |
(PDF 160kb)
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| 7: Weed, Disease & Pest Overview |
(PDF 217kb)
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| 8: Weed Management |
(PDF 688kb)
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| 9: Disease Management |
(PDF 672kb)
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| 10: Invertebrate Pest Management |
(PDF 512kb)
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| 11: Vertebrate Pest Management |
(PDF 61kb)
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| 12: Contamination Risk Management |
(PDF 131kb)
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| 13 & 14: Machinery and Waste Management |
(PDF 101kb)
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| 15: Resources |
(PDF 36kb)
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| 16, 17 & 18: References, Bibliography & Index |
(PDF 142kb)
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Revision history
Major revisions to the organic viticulture manual are listed below. You can easily update your copy of the manual by downloading just the revised sections.
Version | Page footer date | Section revised | Changes |
1 | June 2005 | - | First version |
2 | January 2007 | 10 Invertebrate pest management | Section added on grasshoppers and locusts.
Mite section updated. |
Contacts
For further information about organic horticulture or to obtain a hard copy or CD-ROM version of Organic viticulture: an Australian manual, contact:
David Madge
Primary Industries Research Victoria
Department of Primary Industries
PO Box 905, Mildura, Victoria 3502
Ph: (03) 50514500
Fax: (03) 50514523
Email: david.madge@dpi.vic.gov.au
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