The Kiwi lawyer hand-picked to lead global wine body OIV

Kiwi lawyer John Barker will be the first director-general of the International Organisation of Vine and Wine from outside Europe in 100 years. Photo / Supplied

“I always find wine people are good people,” says Dr John Barker, the Kiwi director-general-designate of the International Organisation of Vine and Wine as he packs up for a new life in France.

The Auckland lawyer, who has specialised in the wine sector since his university days, will be the first director-general of this 100-year-old United Nations of Wine to be elected from outside Europe, so we can safely assume he knows plenty of “wine people”.

Getting elected to the top job in the 50-member intergovernmental organisation, which sets the rules for the global wine industry, took Barker to 21 wine-producing countries, often several times.

And when he goes on to say, “most experiences with wine people have been good ones”, he doesn’t mean he knows that from sitting in the sun in Italy, Marlborough or France, drinking the product with viticulturists and winemakers.

The work of the organisation, better known as OIV, is the serious side of growing wine - scientific and technical matters which reach into law and the farthest corners of the wine-producing world, including New Zealand.

The OIV website has a United Nations flavour about it, so it’s no surprise to learn that’s what the organisation is to the vine and wine world.

Barker agrees it’s fair to say that despite its impact on the sector, most New Zealanders will never have heard of OIV - even some of the country’s winegrowers won’t know it well.

But make no mistake, Barker’s New Zealand Government-backed election success - 46 out of 47 eligible member states voted for him - was a red-letter day for New Zealand.

“For me, it’s a great honour, something I’ve worked towards for a long time ... for New Zealand it’s really strong recognition of the credibility and respect the industry has built over the years.”

The fact that never before has someone from outside Europe been elected to the five-year job - part chief executive, part diplomat, part OIV figurehead - “says a lot about how seriously the wine world takes New Zealand now”, says Barker, who will be based at OIV’s headquarters in Dijon, France from January 1.

“The OIV is important to us in New Zealand and how we trade around the world. More broadly for the wine sector, it’s important to have our sector represented at that level.”

The OIV sets the baseline for the industry around the world and has an important effect on trade, says Barker.

“It’s really the place where internationally the big issues of the sector are debated.

“For example, if the OIV makes a recommendation about winemaking practice, that automatically gets implemented into European law and influences rules in lots of countries.”

The OIV represents 87 per cent of global wine producers and 71 per cent of wine consumed globally.

“We [New Zealand] do want to participate in the global system and we do want to be able to have our say. We feel we have a lot to contribute and we can do that by having people in these positions in international organisations,” says Barker.

Supported by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, and and the Ministry for Primary Industries, Barker had a crack at being elected in 2018, but was beaten by the Spanish candidate, who steps down in December.

“We ran a very strong campaign ... after seven rounds of voting over six months, we were neck-and-neck. We got very close but couldn’t get over the line,” he recalls.

“[That] first campaign showed we are serious about this - it established the idea that it was time for a Southern Hemisphere country to step up.”

New Zealand wine exports rose by 25 per cent to $2.4 billion in the 12 months to May 2023, despite a smaller harvest with yields falling by 6 per cent. The country exports 80 per cent of its wine production.

It is now the world’s sixth-largest wine exporter by value, despite producing only 1 per cent of the world’s wine, according to NZ Winegrowers.

Dr Barker's election is seen as a mark of global respect for the New Zealand wine industry's credentials.

Barker says his election isn’t about spurring more sales of New Zealand wine. “It’s more about making sure we have the right trade environment as an industry.

“One of my ambitions for the organisation is to take it a little further in terms of thinking about what we can do together as a global organisation on some issues - almost pre-trade. Not issues of competition, more of the good health of the industry as a whole, working on things like sustainability and climate change, to help the industry to flourish more generally, not necessarily just about making rules.

“One of the things I have learned in New Zealand, which has made it so successful, is the power of working together to identify shared interests and share knowledge, to be ambitious. All of these things formed me, and I will bring to the role.”

The OIV is confronting some big issues - foremost of which is climate change, says Barker.

The wine industry is very much in the firing line because it has a perennial crop, often grown in areas susceptible to climatic shifts. As the climate warms and changes, the conditions in which grapes are grown start to shift, he says. Fires cause smoke damage to grapes and warming temperatures invite in new pests, for example.

As well as grappling with the same issues as other primary sectors, such as the Covid hangover, the war in Ukraine and supply chain woes, the industry is being challenged in other ways, including demographic changes in consumption, the new digital economy, the rise of AI, new technologies and demand for no-alcohol wine.

Barker has been involved with the OIV as a law expert delegate - “I’m not an expert in oenology” - since 2005. As president of OIV’s law and economy commission, he recalls that he and the president of the oenology commission “put a huge amount of effort” into finding a way forward on the gnarly question of removing alcohol from wine.

“You need to open up the market to some of these products for which there is strong demand, but at the same time, some would say, and continue to say, this is not wine because it’s had technology intervention to remove alcohol which is naturally present.

“We were able to find a position all member countries were happy with. That’s the sort of thing the OIV deals with, trying to find a way through. It’s not always easy.”

The wheels of a global organisation can grind slowly. Resolutions in 2012 from that work will only this year pass into European regulations, says Barker.

“The perspective of the wine sector is that the grapevine has been cultivated for 11,000 years - even before we had bread.”

Barker gets called “a wine lawyer”, not a handle that’s often used in New Zealand.

His fascination with the industry began as a child when his father, a wine lover and also a lawyer, regularly took the family to vineyards and orchards in west Auckland.

“The day after I finished school, mum said ‘you’re not going to sit around here, go get a job’.” I got a job in a wine shop. I found it a really fascinating world. It was one of those really old-school shops with medium-sweet sherries and port.

“It was 1987 and wine was just starting up in New Zealand. It was an exciting time when we were starting to see the names we are familiar with now.”

Barker worked in the wine shop while at law school in Auckland, dreaming of how he could combine law and wine into a career.

The opportunity came to study and practise wine law in Melbourne, followed by doctoral research in law and geography entitled “Different Worlds: law and the changing geographies of wine in France and New Zealand”. His thesis was produced in partnership with INRA-ENESAD, Universite de Bourgogne, in Dijon.

Barker combined his OIV role as a law expert and a commission president with work at New Zealand Winegrowers.

That organisation’s chief executive, Philip Gregan, says Barker is “uniquely qualified” for his new role.

“He was for 10 years general counsel and general manager advocacy for NZ Winegrowers, while more recently he has been operating his own legal and consulting practice, focused primarily on the wine sector and regulation in the international wine industry.

“There is no doubt John has the vision and the commitment to grow and strengthen the OIV, to ensure that it effectively addresses the key issues facing the sector, both now and in the future. His election reflects the growing reputation and status the New Zealand wine industry has built in recent decades as a major player in global wine markets and trade,” says Gregan.

The Herald put it to Barker that comparing the OIV to a United Nations isn’t necessarily a tribute, given questions over its namesake’s influence and effectiveness.

So just how effective is the OIV?

Very, he says.

“It’s very influential. It’s been going 100 years, it makes rules for key markets and in that respect is extremely influential in that it influences a lot of markets.

“In terms of its effectiveness, it is an effective organisation. It last had a big review of its structure in 2001 and certainly part of my ambition for the organisation is to bring it up to date, to make sure we can be effective in future given the nature of the challenges we are facing.”

The OIV employs 20 permanent staff in France but relies on a network of more than 500 experts. Its annual budget in recent years has been €3.5 million (NZ$6.37m).

Is that enough given the size of the issues Barker says the OIV must tackle?

He wants to get his feet under his new desk before talking budgets. And besides, a global economic downturn isn’t the best time to be asking governments for more money.

One of his first big jobs, after his inauguration special event, will be to pull together the OIV’s centenary celebrations in Dijon next year.

They’re off to a fine start with the regional government donating a landmark 17th Century building and renovations costing €18mfor the occasion.

Andrea Fox joined the Herald as a senior business journalist in 2018 and specialises in writing about the dairy industry, agribusiness, exporting and the logistics sector and supply chains.