Wine growers face new complexities

hat a difference a decade makes. The growth of California‘s wine industry is remarkable, particularly since 1991 not coincidentally, the year “60 Minutes” popularized results of a study that found moderate wine consumption can reduce the risk of heart disease. Thanks to a robust U.S. economy and ever-growing demand for premium wines (a specialty of California’s North Coast and Central Coast regions), grape production and related industries now infuse $33 billion into the state’s economy, and California now produces well over 90% of the nation’s wine grapes, according to the Wine Institute. The most obvious sign of all this activity is the skyrocketing level of vineyard plantings. Recent reports from the Allied Grape Growers and California A ricultural Statistics Service in-