The Improvement of the Production and Quality: the case of wine production in the Eastern Lombardy during the 19th and 20th Centuries (provinces of Bergamo and Brescia)

The paper illustrates the progressive improvement of the quality and retailing of wine in the provinces of Bergamo and Brescia (Eastern Lombardy) during the 19th and 20th centuries. Some important changes concerned winegrowing and winemaking and led to improve the quality of the wine. In the early 19th century most of viticulturists in fact produced low quality wine: there were only two relevant exceptions. Outbreaks of powdery mildew, peronospora, and phylloxera seriously damaged vines and grapes and strongly reduced the land cultivated by vines as well as the number of winemakers. These latter had to renew their vines and they also created consortia for the protection and sale of their wine. During the 20th century, the viticulture and winemaking benefited from the improvements and innovations concerning the oenological technology and transport networks. Since the 1960s the “enotechno-revolution” allowed best winemakers to create new high quality sparkling wines and DOC (or DOCG) wines which had a great success on the main international markets.