Ningxia uncorks unprecedented wine contest

Now that the grape harvest season has come to an end, 48 winemakers from 18 nations are awaiting the next phase of the Ningxia Wine Challenge, in which they are competing for cash prizes in China's most high-profile wine region. The post-fermentation analysis is now beginning for wines that will be ready to drink in 2017.

The two-year challenge, a contest with 600,000 yuan ($93,750) in cash prizes on the line, was organized by the Ningxia Hui autonomous region's wine federation and supported by its Bureau of Grape Industry Development. A lottery system partnered winemakers and wineries, then grants each team 3 hectares of cabernet sauvignon grapes to make wine. The results are now in fermentation tanks and will be judged in 2017, with the top 10 percent receiving 100,000 yuan each and the next 20 percent getting 20,000 yuan each. The organizers also plan to give each winemaker several thousand bottles of the wine he or she makes.

"It's a good opportunity for many to experience the potential of Ningxia first-hand," says Alessio Fortunato, a participating winemaker from Italy who is currently a professor at Northwest Agriculture and Forestry University in Xi'an, Shaanxi province.