wine. The first to establish a national  sustainability programme, more than 96 per cent of  

vine-growing land here is managed according  to specific environmental standards.  

The industry has pledged to be carbon neutral by  2050, and more producers are going organic.  

Of around 1400 registered growers and wineries,  more than 13 per cent are certified organic,  

compared to less than one per  cent two decades ago.  

I've come to the south of the country in the  renowned Pinot Noir region of Central Otago,  

where almost a quarter of producers are organic,  

to see for myself the challenges and  rewards of an all-natural harvest.  

Rosie! Hi! Nice to see you.

Beautiful property. At Carrick winery they've  

transformed semi-arid grazing land into  picture-postcard vine terraces.

The vineyard's been certified  organic since 2008.

That means that we're not using any pesticides,  herbicides or fungicides in the vineyard  

or any synthetic fertilisers either. But going organic isn't easy or cheap.  

Here, the dramatic change in land, waste  and soil management initially sent costs  

soaring and yields plummeting. Now vines are back to their prime, and the deep  

beds of fine porous mineral sands below them, no  longer leach chemicals into the environment.

Anything going through our soil is going to go  into that water and eventually end up in our  

community, so it's really important that we think  about what we're putting onto our land here.

Of 16 wines produced here, four are  natural, meaning no filtration, processing,  

or standard additives are used to make wines  fruitier, fresher and keep for longer.

It's quite cloudy, it's  almost orange in colour.

While some consumers might find this  cloudy Riesling hard to swallow…

Mmm, I like it. ….the 100% organic wine tastes fine to me.

But in the early days, getting fellow producers to  embrace change wasn't as easy as it is now.

Duncan. Ah, hello!

Hello lovely to meet you! Passionate organic winemaker Duncan Forsyth has  

seen a sea-change in the way vines and the wine  they produce are cultivated and processed.

Organics was probably the domain of sandal-wearing  

hippies 20 years ago. Now it's  just seen as a baseline.  

Not content with adopting the usual land,  waste, water and renewable energy management,  

Duncan found himself at the forefront of a  bold tilt at the dirtiest part of wine's carbon  

footprint; the classic glass bottle. Making, transporting and even reusing heavy  

glass bottles uses fossil fuels  and emits greenhouse gases.

We were the first in New Zealand to start selling wine in a keg. So, it's like a very  

small beer keg, it's about 20 litres and  holds two and a half cases of wine.  

But replacing elegant, visually appealing  glass bottles with stubby refillable kegs  

proved controversial. I wasn't seen as the most popular person.  

It was seen as dumbing down the industry. And I  got a number of phone calls with people asking  

what I was doing, how dare I? It's that easy.

But sticking to their guns, or in this case kegs,  

is proving profitable and popular, up  from one, to 10 percent of total sales.  

And far from dumb or downmarket, most of Mount  Edward's kegs go to high-end outlets.

Acclaimed for its pursuit of renewable  energy and sustainability, this hotel  

bar has seven wines on tap, each one coming  directly from nearby vineyards in kegs.

That cuts thousands of 'wine miles' bottles of the  same product would take via the regular storage,  

wholesale and distribution  chains spanning the country.

Eliminating transportation costs, it kind of  reduces the carbon footprint as well, every little  

bit that we can do, to do that, is huge. Wine by the keg isn't so practical when it comes  

to shipping wine to the biggest and most valuable  market; individual consumers overseas.

Like all the growers I'm visiting, Blair Walter  is embracing lightweight bottles as a way of  

reducing the carbon emissions produced  in the export of his premium wines.

The thinner bottles are up to 50 per cent  lighter than traditional longnecks.  

That's 417 grams, you feel how light it is. What goes inside the bottle comes from biodiverse  

fields where a range of plants and  vine-friendly, pest-eating insects  

thrive amongst the grapes. Wastes such as cuttings, cow manure and  

even eggshells from the vineyard chickens are  mixed into a compost, to feed the vines.  

How much better is that than  getting your fertilizer and nutrient  

for the vineyard from a sack? By growing naturally, recycling organics  

and ensuring suppliers use minimal packaging,  this entire commercial business produces less  

waste than a typical domestic household. So we have a domestic-sized wheelie bin that's  

emptied fortnightly and that's  the only waste to landfill.

Blair and his fellow organic winemakers maybe  leading New Zealand's charge to sustainability,  

but despite all the hard work being done,  they're the first to admit that there  

is still a long road ahead. And it's consumers who will ultimately  

drive others to change.