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  Farewell to corks
Cork caps farewell! The new plastic or resinous formulas which we ever more often open are destined to become the substitute of cork within a few years, with the acquiescence of purists and oenologists.
Cork production is not sufficient to satisfy the request for wine bottle caps produced in the world, which have already reached over 18 billion units and which will reach around 25 billion in 2010.
Cork cultivation is concentrated in the Mediterranean basin, in Spain, Portugal, France, Italy, Turkey and Countries of Northern Africa, and it takes place over a surface of over 2 million hectares which give a productive potential of 20 billion cork caps of which 50% in a single piece (the higher quality ones) and the other 50% of agglomerates.
According to Coldiretti, in Italy over 80.000 tons of "gentile" cork are produced and 30.000 tons of "sugherone", obtained from the cultivation of around 100.000 hectares, 90% of them in Sardegna. In the island the situation is critical, with a net decrease in production, also caused by fires.
The National wine sector uses for the production of cork caps over 60% of the marketed cork, but National production - continues Coldiretti – is not sufficient to satisfy the working capacity of the transformation systems and in prospect the world production will not be able to satisfy the request for cork caps for bottles of wine.
There are two consequences: on one hand the eternal companion of the wine bottle will go disappearing, with consequent image damage for the product and particularly for prized wines which want nothing but the cork. On the other hand, there will also be considerable environmental consequences: the impoverishment of the terrain that is uncultivated causes an acceleration in the process of desertification of the territory, especially in the Mediterranean area.May.2002 Coldiretti (In Italian)
Cork and the environment
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