Jancis Robinson

World oak resources

Appears in
Oxford Companion to Wine
Oxford Companion to Wine

By Jancis Robinson

Published 2006

  • About

All statistics regarding the amount of standing timber in a given country should be read with some caution, partly because it is hard to measure the contents of the forests and partly because, even when statistics are available, they are from different years and are not always directly comparable. The figures in the table below are the most recent available but sometimes they include species that are inappropriate for cooperage. (See over for the various sources of information.)

The ages of the oak forests are often given and sometimes also the species. In Poland, for example, approximately 75% of the stands are less than 80 years old, as they are in Hungary. Cooperage quality oak should be at least 80 years old and preferably much older.