Italiano
Southern Italy must believe in itself
From Taormina Gourmet, where the awards ceremony was held for the 69 labels honored by Sud Top Wine, the support for the world of wine from the regional assessors of Calabria and Sicily.
"Southern Italy today has all the characteristics to be able to believe strongly in itself": from "Sud Top Wine," a competition conceived by Cronache di Gusto, as part of "Taormina Gourmet," comes the support of the agriculture councillors of the Calabria and Sicily regions as part of the award ceremony for the 69 wines selected by an international jury out of more than 700 labels from six Italian regions.
"I have enthusiastically joined this event," said Calabria Region Agriculture Councillor Gianluca Gallo, "which highlights the wines of Southern Italy and therefore of Calabria, a region that is growing in terms of wine production and where wineries with great ambition are working on the quality of their productions. The South certainly needs to grow in terms of awareness of its potential, and this can be done by creating synergy and inviting visitors to come to the South to look at it with amazed eyes, just as it happens to foreigners who come to Italy.
"Sud Top Wine represents an important milestone in bringing out what the South is able to offer," said the Sicilian Region's Agriculture Councillor Luca Sammartino, "in terms of the quality of wines but also in terms of gastronomy, as well as the ability of farmers to sustain an agriculture that is very often heroic. The Sicilian Region has decided to support this sector and give life to a brand Sicily in synergy with the Consortia of the territory, which has led to the achievement of the international recognition of Sicily as a European Food and Wine Region in 2025 by the Igcat. A very important result for the enhancement of the extraordinary products that this land together with the combination of landscape and food and wine."
Opening the discussion was Cronache di Gusto editor Fabrizio Carrera, who welcomed the many producers present in Taormina from as many as six Italian regions-Sicily, Calabria, Puglia, Campania, Sardinia and Basilicata. One of the goals of Sud Top Wine has always been to bring international critics closer to the wines of Southern Italy, as Federico Latteri, a member of the jury that selected the winning wines in recent months, pointed out. "We wanted to bring journalists and experts from all over the world closer to our wines," Latteri stressed, "and with the passing of the editions we find that the wines are increasingly appreciated and recognized. This is an important signal that shows us how we are on the right track." Claudia Stern, journalist for Vinum magazine and founder of Wine & Glory, pointed out that it was precisely thanks to Sud Top Wine that she was able to delve into the incredible diversity of the varieties of Southern Italy, while Daniele Cernilli, founder of DoctorWine, pointed out that only in the last 20 years has the South really emerged and even international critics, who had great preconceptions, still not completely gone, have learned in recent years to know and appreciate the wines of Southern Italy. To do a good job, however, we need to change the way wine is communicated, starting with the terms that are used, and we necessarily need to start with the narrative of the territories.
At the end of the panel discussion was the awarding of the 69 wines selected by the international jury - composed of Wojciech Bońkowski, Master of Wine and editor of the Polish magazine Ferment, Federico Latteri of Cronache di Gusto, Anthony Rose, contributor of Decanter magazine, Eleonora Scholes, of the Russian online magazine Spazio Vino, and Claudia Stern, journalist of Vinum magazine and founder of Wine & Glory-with the presentation of parchments to the many producers in the room from six Italian regions.
