Rising Tide of Tempranillo

In the decade to 2010 the area planted to the Tempranillo variety expanded at a much faster rate than any other wine grape variety.

In fact it clearly outstripped all other varieties by a handsome margin.

Over that decade Tempranillo planting increased worldwide by 140,000 hectares. The largest increase of the next most popular was Syrah/Shiraz, which increased by 80,000 hectares.

To give these figures some perspective the area under wine grapes in Australia is just under 150,000 hectares.

Graph shows 35 grape varieties experiencing increased plantings from 2000 to 2010. The tall bar at the left shows how emphatically the world is turning to Tempranillo.

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Tempranillo in Australia

The area of Australian vineyards planted to Tempranillo is increasing steadily. In 2000 only 41 hectares were planted to the variety, but by 2010 the area had grown to 476 and over 300 producers are making wine.

But we still have a long way to go. The area planted to this variety is still comprises only 0.30% of the area planted to red wine varieties in Australia.

Surprisingly the only Australian wine region which has embraced Tempranillo wholeheatedly is the Southern Highlands region of NSW where Tempranillo covers 13.3% of the vineyard area, followed by Pinot Noir (11.7%), Cabernet Sauvignon (10.7%) and Shiraz (10.2%).

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