Sustainable farming is a popular term in California and is widely looked at as a good thing. Wine industry leaders say a lot of growers are already operating this way.
There are several sustainability groups in California that offer certification for growers to prove their operations are all around sustainable. Allied Grape Growers President and CEO Nat Dibuduo says a lot of their growers operate in this way already, they just don’t have the paperwork.
Dibuduo says he fully supports being good stewards of the land and running an operation in a sustainable manner. It costs a lot to be certified in one of these programs and he believes that the certification needs to provide some economic return for growers to participate.