Moravia, with roughly 95 percent of the nation's vine plantings, is the engine room of the Czech Republic's wine industry. The center of intensively farmed bulk-wine production is also showing great promise as a producer of quality white wines. This is largely thanks to its cool climate, comparable in many ways to that in Nahe or Pfalz, the white-wine specialists a few hundred miles west in Germany. Moravian winelands enjoy a vineyard year well suited to the production of complex aromatics with good acidity.
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Moravia's climate is described by the Czech wine authorities as 'transient': widely continental but with occasional maritime influences when weather patterns blow in from the Atlantic. Brno, the largest Moravian city, is located almost perfectly at the heart of continental Europe, equidistant from the English Channel and the Black Sea. Its continental position and the local topography mean it is relatively dry (average annual rainfall amounts to little more than 20 inches/50cm) and sunny (2244 sunshine hours on average each year).
As a result of this mild, bright growing season, aromatic whites such as the Loire Valley's Sauvignon Blanc and the Alsatian trio of Pinot Gris, Gewurztraminer and Riesling are able to ripen slowly and completely. The grapes develop high levels of flavonoids while retaining the pronounced, crisp acidity which makes them so refreshing. Moravia's position on the 49th parallel puts it at the same latitude as northern Alsace, as well as Champagne and the German regions mentioned above. Its first foray onto the international wine market has shown it capable of taking on these celebrated heavyweights of the white-wine world.
Although still a small part of the overall wine scene, red wine is improving in Moravia, mostly due to technological advances in winemaking rather than any climatic change or newly discovered terroirs. In London's Decanter World Wine Awards of 2011, 12 out of 18 Moravian reds submitted were awarded medals. The investments that the Czech government made in its wine industry at the turn of the new century are paying off.
