Wine tourism refers to tourism

Tourism

Tourism is travel for recreational, leisure or business purposes. The World Tourism Organization defines tourists as people "traveling to and staying in places outside their usual environment for not more than one consecutive year for leisure, business and other purposes".Tourism has become a...

 whose purpose is or includes the tasting, consumption or purchase of wine

Wine

Wine is an alcoholic beverage, made of fermented fruit juice, usually from grapes. The natural chemical balance of grapes lets them ferment without the addition of sugars, acids, enzymes, or other nutrients. Grape wine is produced by fermenting crushed grapes using various types of yeast. Yeast...

, often at or near the source. Wine tourism can consist of visits to wineries

Winery

A winery is a building or property that produces wine, or a business involved in the production of wine, such as a wine company. Some wine companies own many wineries. Besides wine making equipment, larger wineries may also feature warehouses, bottling lines, laboratories, and large expanses of...

, vineyard

Vineyard

A vineyard is a plantation of grape-bearing vines, grown mainly for winemaking, but also raisins, table grapes and non-alcoholic grape juice...

s and restaurant

Restaurant

A restaurant is an establishment which prepares and serves food and drink to customers in return for money. Meals are generally served and eaten on premises, but many restaurants also offer take-out and food delivery services...

s known to offer unique vintages, as well as organized wine tours, wine festivals or other special events.

Many wine regions around the world have found it financially beneficial to promote such tourism; accordingly, growers associations and others in the hospitality industry in wine regions have spent significant amounts of money over the years to promote such tourism. This is true not only to "Old World" producers (such as Spain, Portugal, Hungary, France or Italy), but also for the so-called "New World wine

New World wine

New World wines are those wines produced outside the traditional wine-growing areas of Europe, in particular from Argentina, Australia, Canada, Chile, New Zealand, South Africa and the United States.-Early wines in the Americas:...

" regions (such as Australia, Argentina, Chile, United States or South Africa), where wine tourism plays an important role in advertising their products. In Argentina, for example, the Mendoza Province is becoming one of the tourist destinations in the country as Argentine wine

Argentine wine

The Argentine wine industry is the fifth largest producer of wine in the world. Argentine wine, as with some aspects of Argentine cuisine, has its roots in Spain...

 strides to gain international recognition. Similarly, the National Wine Centre of Australia

National Wine Centre of Australia

The National Wine Centre of Australia is a public exhibition building about winemaking and its industry in South Australia. It contains an interactive permanent exhibition of winemaking, introducing visitors to the technology, varieties and styles of wine...

 showcases the Australian wine industry, and visitors from around the world visit Northern California's Wine Country.

Further reading

• J Carlsen, S Charters, Edith Cowan University (editors), Global Wine Tourism, Cabi Publishing (2006)
• C Michael Hall, Brock Cambourne, Liz Sharples, Niki Macionis, Wine Tourism Around the World: Development, Management and Markets, Elsevier 2000 ISBN 0-7506-4530-X