The Big Interview: Lamberto Frescobaldi

As Italian wine faces up to a number of challenges in 2025, Unione Italiana Vini (UIV) president Lamberto Frescobaldi discusses the global picture with Louis Thomas. Italy may have been cultivating vines for millennia, but 2025 looks like it could be a critical year for the country’s international wine exports. Lamberto Frescobaldi, president of leading Italian wine trade organisation Unione Italiana Vini (UIV), begins with a cautious assessment of the sales performance that can be expected from the Italian wine sector over the course of the coming year. “I think in terms of volumes and value, we will be pretty flat in 2025 – it will be at a similar level to 2024,” he says. Given the current geopolitical climate, a period of stability might be very welcome indeed. One cause of uncertainty is the return of Donald Trump as President of the United States. Trump’s isolationist leanings have made the possibility of imposing high tariffs on wine coming from the European Union a very real prospect. Given that around one-quarter of Italy’s wine exports go to the US, making the country the biggest overseas market for Italian wine by some distance, such a development would certainly be a blow. “The US produces a lot of meat, but what they are allowed to do to their animals, we don’t in Europe, so there has always been a lock on US meat going into Europe, so we will see if he will use sanctions to bring dairy or meat products into Europe,” explains Frescobaldi. However, Frescobaldi believes that Trump’s business sense will dissuade him from trying to punish farmers, including wine producers, in the EU. “I’m not so pessimistic about him introducing sanctions, because if you have sanctions, it naturally brings inflation to his country – one of the things which cost the Democrats the election was inflation, and one of Trump’s goals is to lower inflation,” he continues.

The Russian Question

When not acting as UIV president, Frescobaldi is presiding over his family’s business, the Tuscan wine giant of the same name. While Frescobaldi took the decision to suspend sales to Russia in the aftermath of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Russia remains an important market for Italian wine. Indeed, according to the data, direct exports of Italian wine to Russia between January and September 2024 stood at 545,170 hectolitres, a 55% increase on the 350,260hl total for the same period in 2023. This is also only related to direct exports – a large portion of Italian wine enters the Russian market via neighbouring Lithuania. One thing that Frescobaldi is optimistic about is that 2025 will bring some form of ceasefire agreement between Russia and Ukraine, and that will properly open up the Russian market once again. “I’m definitely sure Russia will become a strong market again,” he says. “It will take some time – they will have to recover from the cost of the war and the sanctions, but Russia has always been close to the Mediterranean and its products, so I see no reason why it would not start again; the question is when. We have to look in front of us, rather than over our shoulders.” Frescobaldi also notes that, in the event of peace, the post-war reconstruction of Ukraine could provide a shot in the arm for Europe as a whole: “A lot of things will have to be rebuilt, and when you are building things, the economy receives a boost, which gives a great opportunity for Europe. So the world is not finished!”

Due South

For Frescobaldi, one global region in particular is ripe for the picking – thanks in a large part to a recent trade deal. On 6 December 2024, the European Union reached an agreement with four members of Mercosur, the South American trade bloc: Argentina, Paraguay, Uruguay and Brazil. One of the features of the agreement is the removal of the high tariffs in place for EU products coming into these countries, including still wine (27% tariff) and sparkling wine (between 20% and 35%). Given the potential difficulties that lie in store for European wine in the US market, this trade deal could provide a vital alternative avenue. “Brazil is a huge market; we really couldn’t get there, but now with this Mercosur agreement, we can,” says Frescobaldi, noting the South American country’s high proportion of people of Italian descent (estimated at around 15% of the total population). As of 2022, Chilean wine made up the lion’s share of Brazil’s wine imports – around 40% of the total value, whereas Italian wine only constituted 8%, according to the Observatory of Economic Complexity (OEC).

“Look at the king of Italian exports, Prosecco: why isn’t it big in South America yet? There is a huge opportunity, and I hope Europe doesn’t change what it has decided to do,” Frescobaldi says, “and there is an opportunity for South Americans to sell more products, like quinoa, to us.”

Riding the wave

From a commercial standpoint, Prosecco is still the standout success of Italian wine. Despite its production zone only making up around 6% of the total vineyard area of Italy, sales of Prosecco constitute more than one-fifth (22%) of the total export value of Italian wine. While Prosecco remains the goose that laid the golden egg for Italian wine, Frescobaldi sees opportunities for the country’s other sparkling wines, but warns that not every region or producer aspiring to emulate the success of the Glera-based, tankmethod fizz has what it takes: “Everyone is trying to surf the wave of demand for sparkling, but some of them are going to fall from their surfboard – there are naturally some varieties which are better suited for producing sparkling wines than others,” he argues. Despite this caution, 2024 was something of a blockbuster year for bollicine. For the first time, Italy produced in excess of one billion bottles of sparkling wine, an 8% increase on 2023’s production, with a quarter of this (251 million bottles) popped opened in foreign markets around the Christmas and New Year period, a 9% increase on the previous year ’s level, according to data from the UIV-Ismea Wine Observatory. This also goes against the general EU trend, with 2024’s production of sparkling wine across all member states 8% below 2023’s level.

Internationally, Italian sparkling wine also leapfrogged Italian still wines last year, with 528m bottles of fizz exported, compared to 524m bottles of still red and rosé, and 460m bottles of white wine. “At the end of the day,” argues Frescobaldi, “the consumers are our most severe judges – some of them will like what they have drunk, and others will not. So, in the next 24-36 months, some of the new sparkling wines will fade away, and others will become strong. That being said, this is an amazing opportunity to capture a younger crowd, that are often somewhat intimidated by the complexity of a red wine from Italy.” What is also notable is the drinks to which young consumers are adding fizz. The UIV-Ismea Wine Observatory suggests that spritzes are hugely popular, estimating that a staggering 2.8bn cocktails made using Italian sparkling wine (especially Prosecco) were consumed around the world last year. One question that has caused sleepless nights for many in the industry is whether crackdowns on alcohol in the name of health will harm the wine sector. Frescobaldi advocates for the view that wine should keep its place on the table. “Some years ago, everyone was against red meat, then chicken, then milk – a cappuccino was considered deadly for you – and now it’s alcohol,” he says. “We have to be careful and avoid being excessive, but if we don’t have those social moments with wine, life can become very boring.” Worries that health authorities might try to hit the drinks sector are not ungrounded – Ireland is due to introduce warnings about links between excessive alcohol consumption and disease on bottle labels in 2026, and the US Surgeon General recently proposed adding cancer warnings to wine packaging. In the face of such an onslaught, Frescobaldi remains a staunch defender of Mediterranean-style moderation, pointing out: “Given how long life expectancy is in Italy [82.2 years, according to the World Health Organization (WHO)], maybe it’s actually a good diet – what we are eating and drinking, our style of life, is far better than it has ever been.” It’s an attitude which brings to mind the Tuscan saying: “A tavola non s’invecchia” – “at the table, one does not grow old”.

Lamberto Frescobaldi at a glance

Lamberto Frescobaldi is the 30th generation to work at Marchesi de’ Frescobaldi, the Tuscan wine powerhouse which counts estates including Montalcino’s Tenuta Castelgiocondo and Super Tuscan producer Ornellaia in its portfolio. He joined the family business in 1989, becoming its president in 2013. In 2022, he was elected as president of the Unione Italiana Vini (UIV), Italy’s national association for wine since 1895, which today brings together more than 800 member companies, which are responsible for more than 50% of Italian wine production and 85% of export turnover.