Drowning in wine?

News of the 2004 harvest to date suggests that the southern hemisphere wine lake is even deeper than it was. Australia is drowning in wine at the moment - and the South Africans have also now done their sums and realise that, contrary to initial expectations, their 2004 crop has also reached record levels. (Chile's vintners, fortunately, reckon they probably produced rather less wine than expected in 2004 – largely because of small berry size, which suggests quality may be rather good.)

But this will not solve Australian wine's unaccustomed malaise. The 2004 vintage is reckoned to be at least 20 per cent bigger than 2003's...