A marine heatwave is defined as sea temperatures that exceed the seasonal threshold for more than five consecutive days. In the UK the marine heatwave threshold for May is 11.3C.
Also, the reds that come out of Burgundy are, according to Mr Labet, the kind consumers increasingly want, as they are typically lighter than New World reds."What is interesting to see is that there is a strong de-consumption of what we call the big reds, made in the US. Wines with a lot of alcohol, aged in new wood."
Less sun and lower temperatures in Burgundy, even with climate change, means less sugar in the grapes and lower alcohol content.Mr Labet remembers when, for 18 months of his first presidency, Donald Trump hit European wine with a 25% import tariff during a dispute over airlines."We were hostages of that situation, and it really did affect our sales to the US. We had a drop of about 50% of our exports to the US."
Regarding the current 10% Trump tariff, he predicts that French wine producers and US merchants will split the cost of the new import duty between them in order to maintain sales.But what will be the impact if in July Trump does decide to increase the tariff on all European Union exports to 20%, as he has threatened to do? "We will go back to the 2019 situation where the market was almost stopped," says Mr Labet.
For French wines in general, things could be even worse.
"When President Trump raised import duties by 25% for one-and-a-half years of his first mandate, we lost about $600m [£450m] very quickly," says Jerome Bauer, president of the French National Wines and Spirits Confederation.in August 2024, after being accused of failing to properly moderate his app to reduce criminality.
Critics had branded the platformbecause of what they said was the amount of criminal activity being discussed on the platform.
However, Mr Durov has denied failing to cooperate with law enforcement over drug trafficking, child sexual abuse content and fraud.The platform has also rejected accusations that its moderation policies are not sufficiently robust.