Chile
The signature red grape was hiding in plain sight as Merlot. For decades.
The region in brief
Chile is the world's fourth-largest wine exporter, shipping 7.8 million hectolitres in 2024 with an export value of €1.5 billion.
Its wine geography runs north to south in a narrow strip, with the Andes to the east, the Pacific to the west, and valley systems from Atacama in the north to Patagonia in the south creating extraordinary mesoclimatic range within a 4,300-kilometre country.
The technology story
On 24 November 1994, French ampelographer Jean-Michel Boursiquot identified vines at Viña Carmen that had been planted and sold as Merlot as a completely different grape: Carménère, thought extinct in Bordeaux since phylloxera. The discovery reshaped Chile's wine identity and revealed that the country had unknowingly been making a different wine for decades. DNA testing changed Chile's narrative overnight.
Chile also has pre-phylloxera vines on their own roots, because phylloxera never established in its sandy coastal soils. Old vines in Itata, Maule and Bío-Bío, País and Cinsault planted up to 150 years ago, are the foundation of a counter-movement: dry-farmed bush vines, low-intervention cellars, no sensors, no oak. In an industry focused on precision viticulture, some of Chile's most forward-looking wines come from the lowest-technology end of the spectrum.
More than 80% of Chile's wine exports have reportedly been certified under the country's sustainability code, an unusual combination of scale (fourth-largest exporter globally) and certification (the highest proportion among major export nations). Emiliana, reportedly the largest certified organic wine producer in South America, is the scale case.
The tensions worth knowing
- The commodity trap: Chile exports at enormous volume and competitive price. Technology of scale is well established. Premium positioning requires a different story, and Carménère still does not have one universally recognised internationally.
- The old-vine movement is explicitly anti-technology: Its argument is that the best Chilean wines need fewer interventions, not more. That tension is the most interesting editorial angle.
- The water question: Chilean glaciers are retreating. The Andes-fed rivers that sustain the Central Valley face the same long-term pressure as Mendoza.
Three surprising facts
Chile's signature red grape was unidentified for decades. Jean-Michel Boursiquot confirmed what was thought to be Merlot was actually Carménère on 24 November 1994. The country had been making a different wine without knowing it.
More than 80% of Chilean wine exports are reportedly certified under the country's sustainability code, the highest proportion among major wine exporting nations, combined with fourth-largest export volume globally.
Some of Chile's most critically praised wines come from 150-year-old dry-farmed bush vines in Itata and Bío-Bío, worked with almost no technology. The most forward-looking argument in Chilean wine is a low-intervention one.
The TerraVine angle
Chile is the New World case for the technology paradox: the most celebrated recent wines came from the least technological vineyards. And the Carménère story is one of the best examples anywhere of science, specifically DNA testing, completely rewriting a wine region's identity.