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www.bookersvineyard.co.uk

Environment Secretary, Margaret Beckett today (Tuesday 17 January) opened a new Defra and EU funded winery when she visited the award-winning Bookers Vineyard on the Bolney Wine Estate, in the heart of rural West Sussex.

At the opening ceremony of the new winery, Mrs. Beckett said:

“The faith and optimism shown here by Bookers Vineyard with this investment, highlights an underlying and very real confidence shown by many within the industry that English wines have a solid economic future.

“It is a testament to the winemaking skills of those here at Bookers, and elsewhere in the industry, that the quality of English wines is now so well known and much talked about.

“English wines are now taking more accolades at international competitions then ever before, and this is against competition from some of the best producers in the world.”

Wine supplied by Bookers Vineyard has been among a selection of English and Welsh wines served at official Defra functions. “

Bookers Vineyard has benefited from a Processing and Marketing Grant (PMG) award of £62,000 under the England Rural Development Scheme (ERDP), jointly funded by Defra and the EU. This contributes to the delivery of the Government's Strategy for Sustainable Farming and Food. The grant, awarded to Bookers in September 2004, has helped this family-run business to upgrade its winery, specifically to modernise processing equipment which has helped to meet increased production from their own vineyard. The quality of the wine has also been improved using state of the art fermentation and filtering equipment, including a grape press, wine vats, fermentation tanks, filtering and bottling equipment.

Sam Linter, Managing Director of Bookers:

“The completion of our new winery means we will be able to produce even better quality wines. We have particularly invested in the latest red wine making equipment, to ensure future vintages of our light and fruity Dark Harvest blend are even better than our previous award winners.”

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