There are a few grapes still out there on the vines, but the verdict on the quality of the 2025 crop was harvested some time ago. After a run of challenging years, South Africa is completing one of its greatest ever vintages. “Seriously promising” is how Eben Sadie, the country’s most famous winemaker, describes it.
Everyone’s happy about what’s being processed in their cellars. But there’s also a countervailing sense of unease about the future of the wine industry. I chatted to a group of producers over dinner recently and the conversation was the only sobering thing about the evening. Donald Trump had just imposed a 31% tariff on South African wines, one of the highest rates in the world. The news could have been worse – the US is “merely” the Cape’s fourth-biggest export market – but that’s not the only thing that is furrowing people’s brows. “The wine industry is in a real dump,” one of them told me.
Things are no better in the UK, alas, the place that imports the most South African wine. “The UK used to be a reference market,” says Alex Dale of Radford Dale, “and it’s become a pain in the arse.” Our ludicrous new duty regime is partly to blame. But so is the enduringly cheap image of basic South African wines.
To keep Cape Chenin Blanc at what they deem to be “competitive” prices, two British supermarkets have asked producers to reduce the alcohol level of their wines.
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