Veneto

Italy’s most productive wine region in the north east (see map under italy). It stretches westward to Lake Garda and northward to the Alps and the Austrian border from the terra firma behind the lagoons and city of venice, an important power in the wine trade of the Middle Ages whose legacy has shaped some wines in Veneto and even elsewhere. In the mid 1990s the volume of wine produced in Veneto overtook that of puglia and sicily, and in 2012 was more than 8.2 million hl/205 million gal. Much of this growth has been due to the runaway success of pinot grigio, followed by that of prosecco, although the entrepreneurial spirit of the producers, co-operatives, and large bottlers has also played a pivotal role.