A survey on wines from organic viticulture from different European countries

A survey was carried out on a thousand wines from organic viticulture from different European countries. Analytical data were collected about the most used quality control parameters (e.g. alcoholic strength, reducing sugars, total acidity and pH, volatile acidity, malic and lactic acid, free and total sulfur dioxide), as well as regarding some compounds harmful for human health, such as ochratoxin A and biogenic amines. The results collected on quality control parameters were generally in agreement with the values normally detectable for conventional wines. Total sulfur dioxide was lower than 110–120 mg/L in the most of the samples and no significant correlation was found between sulfite levels and other parameters. Ochratoxin A (OTA) seemed not a generalized problem for organic wine productions: its concentration was below the European legal limit, in the 95% of the samples analyzed; nevertheless, the risk of OTA pollution seemed higher in certain southern European regions. On the other hand, biogenic amines (BA) appeared a serious problem for organic winemaking and high concentrations were found in many of the analyzed wines. They seemed connected with a bad management of malolactic fermentation, being generally associated with high pHs and volatile acidities.