New Zealand wine brand Yealands Estate Wines has been fined $400,000 after the company admitted keeping inaccurate records and making false statements.
In the Blenheim District Court today Judge Bill Hastings has imposed a fine against Yealands Estate Wines Limited of $400,000.
Pleading guilty to a total of 39 charges today were Yealands Estate Wines Limited, the company’s founder and director at the time of the offending, Peter Yealands, former General Manager Winery Operations, Jeff Fyfe and former Chief Winemaker Tamra Kelly.
Judge Bill Hastings has imposed fines against Yealands Estate Wines Limited of $400,000, Jeff Fyfe of $35,000, Tamra Kelly of $35,000, and Peter Yealands of $30,000.
The charges relate to inaccurate internal wine records, the making of false statements in export eligibility applications and material omissions in wine records relating to the use of sugar - a breach of EU market regulation winemaking requirements.
MPI’s manager of compliance investigations Gary Orr said in a statement, these are the first convictions for offending under the provisions of the Wine Act in New Zealand.
"It is common knowledge in the wine industry that you can’t add sugar post-fermentation to wine destined for the EU market, yet the parties convicted were well aware of what they were doing.
"Peter Yealands (owner at the time) was made aware of what was happening but failed to do anything to stop it.
He also says it's disappointing New Zealand's leading wine company engaged in deliberate deception through the use of falsified records that were designed to deceive routine audit.
"The records relate to more than 6.5 million litres of wine, and around 3.7 million litres of affected wine was exported to Europe between May 2013 and December 2015."
The company is now under different ownership from when these events occurred.
The new chief executive of Yealands Adrian Garforth said the company had taken immediate and decisive action to fix the issues before any charges were laid.
"Systems we have introduced, training and comprehensive audits mean that our wines are fully compliant and breaches of this kind will not happen again. We have taken these charges very seriously," says Mr Garforth.
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