Project “zero treatments and residues on grapes”

A centuries-old history behind it and a great vocation for innovation are the DNA of the Ricci Curbastro estate combined with the great attention to the environment that has seen us protagonists of numerous initiatives in the last thirty years.

The latest creation in chronological order is a project that brings together the three major themes: history and culture, environment and innovation.

In 2012 we planted a vineyard at the gates of Capriolo made with PIWI variety, an acronym that indicates varieties of wine grapes created by intraspecific hybridization resistant to fungal diseases, in German Pilzwiderstandfähig that is resistant to fungi.
These varieties were intended for technical experimentation in our cellar but the vineyard, absolutely free of chemical treatments, was seen as an ideal “gym” to discover the vine and its fruits.

In addition, the vineyard was planted surrounded by hedges and trees typical of the forest formations of the Franciacorta hills: twenty varieties of plants to be discovered by studying leaves, flowers and fruits.
The vineyard, the hedges, the row of mulberries and wicker constitute a micro unit of a traditional Franciacorta landscape, which has now largely disappeared due to agricultural mechanization, the disappearance of silk culture, urbanization and so on.
As a whole it is a nature trail for educational use for schools, easily reachable on foot, and intended for historical research (silk and the Capriolo textile industry, viticulture and oenology in Franciacorta), environmental (low agriculture environmental impact, search for new varieties), naturalistic (nesting of insectivorous birds, discovery of typical trees and shrub species and their properties.
Discover the vineyard will be an outdoor laboratory for schools to discover, walking, a vineyard in all its expressions.

This HISTORICAL CULTURAL part of the project has its own dedicated website www.scopriilvigneto.it

In five years of life the vineyard has never seen a chemical treatment and the grapes harvested in 2014 and 2015 were destined for internal wine-making research in the company and then in 2016 to produce a new Sebino Bianco IGT wine with Zero Treatments and Zero Residue on grapes: INNOVATION. Wine produced in a vineyard certified for the requirement “no phytosanitary treatment during cultivation and no analytically detectable residues on grapes and wine “: the ENVIRONMENT.
The only treatments allowed are those required by law such as MANDATORY FIGHT against Scaphoideus titanus, the buzzer vector of the golden flavescence, carried out with Natural Pyrethrum.
By not analytically detectable is meant: 0.01 PPM and in any case the non-detectability of pesticides on the finished wine product must in any case be guaranteed by the laboratory as a minimum determination limit consistent with the detection limit defined by the reference legislation (REG. 396/2005 and ss.mm.aa).

To achieve this result, a Technical Disciplinary for the Voluntary Certification of Zero Phytosanitary and Zero Residual Treatments (non-analytical detectability) was drawn up, annex 1, which following analysis on grapes performed by different laboratories on over 200 active ingredients, annex 2 and annex 3, made it possible to obtain the certificate of conformity from CSQA Certificazioni Srl, annex 4.

Finally the label of the new wine with the two hedgehogs (Erinaceus europaeus) taken from the emblem of the Ricci Curbastro but also a symbol of uncontaminated environment, the hedgehog is in fact an omnivorous animal and its diet includes insects, snails, frogs and various vegetables. He loves fruit, worms and all the animals that populate the undergrowth, its progressive decrease is due not only to road accidents but to an environment that is no longer uncontaminated.