Sustainable Winegrowing
Everything we do to make wine at Ara is informed by three fundamental beliefs.
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Great fruit is the first requirement for making great wine.
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To make the best of what nature gives us, we need to combine New World innovation and Old World experience.
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You need to look after the land if you want the land to look after you.
Here are some of the steps we’ve taken to minimise our environmental footprint.
Blending tradition and fresh thinking
Certified Sustainable
All winegrowing activities at Ara are certified to be fully sustainable. We belong to Sustainable Winegrowing NZ, an initiative of the NZ Winegrowers Association, and we follow strict management principles to protect the environment. Methods and systems are revised regularly, so that we can continuously improve environmental performance.
Compost
Since our 2016 vintage, we've composted 100% of our winery waste (skins, seeds and MOG). This is applied to Ara’s vineyards before harvest to enhance organic matter levels.
For those who love numbers, in 2016 when we began this process it was 4,000 cubic meters of waste that converted into 8,000 cubic meters of compost.
Protecting Our Water
We've invested a significant amount in our Marlborough winery to establish onsite water treatment.
Now all the run-off water used in production is treated, recycled and reused. This ensures none of this precious resource - vital to winemaking - is wasted.
Courtesy of Only Marlborough
"The land will look after us if we look after the land - simple as that."
Imagery courtesy of MarlboroughNZ
