Now that fags are being stubbed out for the last time all over the UK, authorities are turning their attention to the next social demon in the pack: alcohol. Smoking was vanquished by exorbitant taxes, the banning of smoking in bars, a broad acceptance of the link between smoking and cancer and banning advertising. The same coalition that did for tobacco is assembling to take on alcohol and its bad news for SA wine producers as the UK comprises 28% of the export market for SA wine (alarmingly down from 32% last year).

Sub-£2 in the Guardian: how many bottles from SA?

Legislation to prohibit supermarkets from selling alcohol at a loss will affect SA in particular as SA wine is the second cheapest in the market and features widely in three for a tenner and bogof deals. Given the recent strength of the Rand, there must have been more than one producer selling wine in the UK below cost in December and January.

The decision by the government to increase the cost of drink at 2% above inflation will likewise hit SA budget producers hard as the tax component of cost is relatively larger than for higher priced producers like New Zealand and Portugal.

A campaign to ban alcohol advertizing in the UK could see WOSA (Wines of SA, the exporters mouthpiece) embark on even more harebrained schemes to get the message across that could make the braii boek look like a good idea.

A story in today’s Guardian claims alcohol will kill an extra 250 000 people over the next two decades and with high alcohol wines the SA norm, SA will once again come in for special attention. Low prices, high alcohol levels and a carbon footprint 10 000 Km long are shaping up as an unholy trinity for hard pressed SA producers. As they say in Blighty, it never rains but it pours.