We only import sustainably made wine. But what exactly does that mean? In the book The Triple Bottom Line, Andrew Savits describes it thus; “a sustainable corporation is one that creates profit while protecting the environment and improving the lives of those with whom it interacts.” Or, said another way, sustainability is “the art of doing business in an interdependent world.”
So, when we say we import sustainably made wines, it means we work with wineries that go about the business of making great wine with an eye toward taking better care of the earth and those with whom they interact. For our wineries this takes place in a number of ways:
- Fairtrade wine – A robust international certification program that ensures very specific steps are taken to farm in more environmentally friendly ways, and work with labor in ways that provide them a healthier, safer, more enriching work environment.
- Organic and Biodynamic wine – International certifications that ensure a very high degree of care for the earth in farming, including ending the use of pesticides and other steps.
- BEE – Black Enterprise Empowerment is a South African program for providing equity, training, and opportunity to Black South Africans who were disadvantaged during Apartheid. This program gives workers ownership and influence in the wineries they have often lived and worked on for generations.
- ISO14001 – An international certification of production process that require such sustainable practices as water management, resource waste reduction, and others.
- IPW – A sustainable certification specific to the South African wine industry that ensures sustainable farming practices from vine to bottle.
- ENVIROWINE – A new certification for South African wineries that score at least 80% on the IPW scorecard.
- BWI – A unique South African partnership between the South African wine industry and the conservation sector to minimize the further loss of threatened natural habitat, promote fynbos preservation, removal of invasive species, and to contribute to sustainable wine production.
- WIETA – A certification for South African wineries that ensures fair wages and good working conditions for South African winery workers.
As for Worthwhile Wine Company’s operations,we are a FairTrade Certified Importer. Also, we buy carbon offsets for every shipment of wine that we import, giving us the only portfolio of imported wines that have a domestic US carbon footprint. And, we use alternative energy whenever possible (like the servers running this site), and we donate a portion of our net proceeds to charities in the US and South Africa.
Our wines not only taste great in your glass, you can feel good about how the wine got into your glass.
Enjoy!
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