Italy displaces France as world's top wine producer

France is no longer the world’s top wine producer. According to the International Organisation of Vine and Wine, it has been displaced from the top spot by Italy in 2015.

Italy became the world's top wine producer in 2015. Wikimedia commons

Moreover, France, known for producing the world’s best wine, has been trailing its neighbours Italy and Spain in wine exports for the past nine years.

France and Italy have been involved in a swapping places for the past five years. While it lost out to Italy in 2011, it regained the top spot three years later. However, last year Italy produced 49 million hectolitres compared to 47 million by the French. Spain is in third place with 37 million hectolitres.

The drop in production could be attributed to two factors; lower domestic demand and high cost of exported French wine.

According to the French daily Le Parisien, the French used to consume an average of 100 litres of wine per person in 1960. That figure has now fallen by more than half to 42 litres in 2015.

It also points out that more than 80 percent of French wines sold abroad for more than five euros per litre compared to Italian wines that sell abroad for half that price and Spanish wine which sells for a mere 1.16 euros a litre.

On global scale, wine production registered a slight increase of 2 per cent last year compared to 2014.