Champagne, Burgundy and Beaujolais have joined forces to build an innovative building in Oger that will be used to produce the basic material for certified vine plants.
"This is an absolutely essential project for the future of our vineyards in Champagne, Burgundy and Beaujolais. Three regions and six departments participating in the creation of a facility in our region, it is rare." This is how the president of the Épernay agglomeration, Franck Leroy, was delighted to see the Qanopee (North-East Quarter of Collective Pre-multiplication) project come to fruition, presented at the last community council.
For the first time in France, three vineyards will join forces in their pre-multiplication activity, the first essential step in the production of certified vine plants that winegrowers acquire from nurserymen. This strategic production is threatened by sanitary issues, linked to the climate, due to the spread or emergence of certain diseases," explained Pascal Desautels, vice-president in charge of the wine industry.
The Qanopee project will consist of the construction of a bioclimatic "insect-proof" greenhouse and an operating building." This €8 million project is due to start in June on a 5,000 square meter plot of land in the Oger business park made available by the Champagne Committee. An 8-meter-high high-tech greenhouse, along with an operating building, will emerge after twelve months of work. The agglomeration hopes to create an exemplary tool in terms of energy, with in particular collective self-consumption thanks to photovoltaic panels. The construction of a second and third phase is already envisaged to enlarge this greenhouse, as and when needed.
Last year, the French Institute of Vine and Wine (IFV), the wine industry's research organization, published a new pre-multiplication plan for the entire profession, in order to "preserve plant material from current diseases, whose spread is worrying, and from emerging diseases", but also "to accelerate the availability of innovative plant material or for adaptation purposes". The issue is therefore both health and environmental, the two aspects being inextricably linked. The speed of global warming is leading all the players in the French vineyards to consider the impact of climatic phenomena on vines and wine," Franck Leroy explained. We are delighted that this equipment is being developed in our territories, because this project will provide us with an innovative approach to the vines of the future, which is extremely important.
This project will see the light of day thanks to a major European grant (€4.8 million), with the remainder provided by various local authorities in the Grand Est region, but also in the Bourgogne-Franche-Comté and Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes regions. The ambition of the Qanopee project is to produce technical and economic references for the entire pre-multiplication sector in France.
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