Sustainability Assessment in Wine-Grape Growing in the New World: Economic, Environmental, and Social Indicators for Agricultural Businesses

Indicators have been used in many sustainability assessment methods, however, disagreements over a common definition and scope for the sustainability concept have led to many distinct assessment methods, which are not often directly comparable. Before developing a sustainability assessment, it is essential to: define sustainability and specify the viewpoint of the assessor, the purpose of the assessment, and the context and time frame of the assessment. This article presents a short list of indicators and a method that can be readily adopted by any agricultural business or region to assess sustainability, making any organization, region or crop qualitatively comparable. These indicators were proposed by 83 top-level executives in 14 group interviews conducted using our adapted nominal group technique (ANGT). Executives were sourced from wine-grape growing organisations from New World wine-producing countries that also owned vineyards, and they considered everyday management practices of farms. These indicators, grouped within three categories (economic, environmental, and social) were ranked by their importance. The method defines qualitative indicators that, in the context of distinct wine regions or crops should be quantified to maintain their relevance and usefulness.