Impact of Climate Change in Greek Viticulture

Abstract

The vineyard and its basic product, wine, have played an important role in Greece from ancient times until the present day. The accepted climate change is bound to affect Greek vinicultures. The objective of the present study is to understand the impact of climate change on Greek viticulture using two bioclimatic indices. The indices were calculated using data coming from the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF), and from the regional climate model RegCM3 covering the time period from 1981 to 2100. According to the results of the study, the data from the model RegCM3 approximate in a satisfactory way the reanalysis data in terms of vine growing. Moreover, the bioclimatic index changes show that all the Greek regions steadily switch into warmer and drier bio-climatic categories. This climatic change signal will affect positive the colder Greek regions, which are usually located in high altitudes, while it will negatively affect the warmer ones (island and coastal regions). All these have to be taken in-to consideration by vine growers and winemakers, so as to take the measures in order to ensure the production of quality wines.