Dr Laura Catena Of Catena Zapata: Five Strategies Our Company Is Using To Tackle Climate Change & Become More Sustainable
An Interview With Martita Mestey
Don’t waste too much time feeling bad about something you did or said. A heartfelt apology fixes most personal problems.
As a part of our series about how companies are becoming more sustainable, we had the pleasure of interviewing Dr. Laura Catena.
Dr. Laura Catena is a Harvard and Stanford trained biologist and physician, author, fourth generation vintner, and the founder of the Catena Institute of Wine in Argentina. The Institute is dedicated to preserving the Malbec variety and to elevating Argentine wine. She is currently managing director of her family winery, Bodega Catena Zapata (Est 1902), which in 2023 was voted #1 World’s Best Vineyard by a group of 500 food, wine and travel writers.
Thank you so much for doing this with us! Can you tell us a story about what brought you to this specific career path?
My great grandfather founded the family winery in 1902 when he immigrated from Italy to Argentina. Although I was born into a wine family, my first path was medicine, because I thought that as a medical doctor, I could help the most people in the world and I was not initially interested in wine as a profession. During the 1990’s I went on several trips to France with my father as his translator and fell in love with wine as a consumer. Later, when I had already started working as an emergency physician in San Francisco (which I loved!) I realized that my father needed help establishing Argentina as a producer of wines that could stand with the best of the world. I first got involved on the viticultural side because of my background in biology and later I started managing different sectors of the family winery while still practicing emergency medicine and going back and forth from the USA to Argentina. Today, with all the work we are doing in sustainability and all the jobs that our industry provides in my birth region of Mendoza, I am confident that we are helping lots of people through our wines. Also, wine in moderation (and moderation is key) especially paired with the Mediterranean diet can lead to a better life, joyful moments with friends and family and better cardiovascular health.
What is the mission of your company? What problems are you aiming to solve?
The mission of our family winery, Catena, is to elevate Argentine wine for another 200 years.
Our family started making wine in Italy 200 years ago, and my father is recognized as the person who put Argentine wine and malbec on the world wine map. My personal goal is to continue my father’s mission of making Argentine wines that can stand with the best of the world, and to continue elevating Argentine wine for the generations to come.
Wine is a cultural beverage that maintains farming communities all over, and that allows us to travel through our palates to many parts of the world. Our mission at Catena is to provide a joyful and hedonistic experience to wine lovers around the world, and to in so doing maintain the farming culture of our Andean region in Mendoza, Argentina.
With climate change and other global challenges, this mission requires a great deal of thinking and strategy, and that is why I founded the Catena Institute in 1995, whose mission is to “use science to preserve nature and culture”.
Can you tell our readers about the initiatives that you or your company are taking to address climate change or sustainability? Can you give an example for each?
- We have weather stations in all our vineyards, which allow us to monitor temperatures. We have found that in some of our high-altitude vineyards, especially in the Uco Valley, the average temperature is actually getting slightly cooler. Planting at higher altitudes can be a tool to address climate change and that is exactly what we are doing in the Uco Valley with vineyards between 3,000 and 5,000 feet elevation in Mendoza, Argentina.
- Although the last two years we have had a large amount of snow, the Andean glacier water has been decreasing over time. We have moved all our vineyards from flood irrigated to drip irrigated which saves a lot of water. Also, at the Catena Institute, one of our staff members is doing a PhD in water management science in order to help us tackle water issues in the most science-based way.
- There is a vineyard biodiversity crisis in the world, because many of the world’s vineyards are planted with single clones of wine varieties. And with unpredictable climate, a more biodiverse vineyard is more resilient. In Argentina, 90% of vineyards are planted with what we call “massale” selections where the vines are most biodiverse and planted in the traditional method of taking diverse cuttings from one vineyard to plant another. In the rest of the world, where clones dominate, this percentage of biodiverse vines is usually under 10%. At Catena, our family winery, we maintain two large nurseries to preserve all this biodiverse plant material and we are doing work to preserve old vines (vineyards are often replanted at 25 years to increase yields).
- There is a crisis in agriculture because many people prefer to live in cities and leave the countryside. Our family provides 137 homes for our vineyard employees to live in with their families, and we provide educational/transport support so that our vineyard employee’s children can have the same opportunities as city children.
- Reducing bottle weight. Through working with local glass manufacturers (99% of our glass is produced locally) we have reduced the glass bottle weight of our wines by 40% over the last 15 years. Most recently we have made dramatic reductions in our most popular luxury bottling — Catena Malbec — with a 28% and 46% bottle weight reduction which has a significant impact in reducing carbon emissions. Up to 60% of the emissions generated by a bottle of wine come from the bottle weight. We are accompanying this bottle weight reduction by a consumer education campaign. Sometimes a heavier bottle appears more premium and we want to help change that perception.
How would you articulate how a business can become more profitable by being more sustainable and more environmentally conscious? Can you share a story or example?
The story of how we discovered that our highest and coolest climate vineyards yielded the most elegant wines with the most complexity and capacity to age, is a good example. Thirty years ago, my father planted the Adrianna Vineyard at almost 5,000 feet elevation in search of cooler climate. It turned out that vines grown at that altitude not only had better acidity and brighter aromas but the intense mountain sun resulted in higher concentration of tannins in the skins and therefore richer flavors. Today, because all our Catena Zapata vineyards are located at high altitude, we are relatively shielded from the warmer climates that come with climate change because at high altitude the average temperatures are not increasing (this is a special mountain phenomenon). These high-altitude wines get higher ratings and are priced higher, and therefore provide a sustainable protection from climate change.
The youth led climate strikes of September 2019 showed an impressive degree of activism and initiative by young people on behalf of climate change. This was great, and there is still plenty that needs to be done. In your opinion what are a few things parents should do to inspire the next generation to become engaged in sustainability and the environmental movement?
1 . Recycle and use lighter weight/less packaging. We all love pretty things which often come with a lot of packaging. Wrap gifts in recycled paper/magazines and buy fewer things that you actually need of better quality — my example would be clothes. In Argentina people often wear the same pair of jeans all week, and it has been shown that if we wash our jeans less frequently, we are wasting a lot less water. Our bodies are covered in benefic microbes, and we often exaggerate cleaning.
2 . Buy imperfect looking fruits and vegetables. Our obsession with fruits and vegetables looking perfect and being perfectly shaped has led to the development of non-biodiverse single clones of many fruits and vegetables. By choosing to buy more biodiverse fruits and vegetables we are making a statement. Also, there is too much “imperfect” food being thrown out, and a fruit or vegetable with a small imperfection can be easily eaten and won’t harm anybody.
3 . Use less water and collect water. At my house I collect shower water and use it to flush the toilet. Every person can find a way to use less water in their personal life.
4 . Walk rather than drive to places. I travel all over the world to sell our wines. If my first appointment of the day is less than an hour away, I always walk. I get my morning exercise, absorb the local culture, and save money at the same time.
5 . Consider making a zoom call instead of getting on a plane. I can’t as one person visit all the great people that sell our wines in over 60 countries around the world. I have developed the “15 minute virtual wine tasting”. Our wines are sent to a wine buyer very far away and we talk about the wines over zoom. You’d be surprised about how much you can do over 15 minutes on a zoom call with props such as vineyard rocks, a glass of wine, and good photos to share.
What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started” and why?
- Study things you love just for the fun. They are most likely to come in handy. I was one class short of minoring in French at Harvard during my undergraduate years. People told me I would never use my French. Today I do business with the French Negociants who sell two of our most collected wines Nicolás Catena Zapata and Adrianna Vineyard Mundus, and being fluent in French has been very useful. Also, I was able to read many of the ancient books that only existed in French when I wrote my book “Malbec mon amour” about the history of Malbec from France to Argentina.
- Don’t waste too much time feeling bad about something you did or said. A heartfelt apology fixes most personal problems.
- A daily morning walk in nature or pilates on the patio is all that you need to start the day well. Be conscious about a morning mindfulness practice.
None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story about that?
Yes, my father. I firmly believe that most people live their lives wanting to be accepted just the way they are, and that the worst thing you can do to somebody is to try to change their essence. When I started working with my dad who is really calm (and I am not), he used to tell me that I should be more chill and not show my emotions as much. A few years later I asked my dad to help me talk to somebody because I thought he would do a better job than I would. My father turned to me and said — “I think you are going to do a better job than I would. People know that what you say is what you mean. And by showing your emotions you are communicating honesty and empathy. Don’t change your honest and direct way of being towards people because that is why you are trusted, and trust is the key to success.”
You are a person of great influence and doing some great things for the world! If you could inspire a movement that would bring the greatest amount of good to the greatest amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂
I honestly believe that people are happiest when they are helping others. A movement where each one of us is making 5 personal commitments to helping our planet and our communities would go a long way to make the world a better place. It could be called #FiveCommitments (kind of like the 10 commandments?)
Do you have a favorite life lesson quote? Can you tell us how that was relevant to you in your own life?
Hard on issues, soft on people.
To do a good job in any profession, one must be detail oriented and demanding of oneself and others. But there is never an excuse for hurting someone’s feelings and that is why I love this phrase.
What is the best way for our readers to continue to follow your work online?
Instagram @lauracatenamd
And for the wines I am connected to:
Instagram:
@catenawines
@Lucawines
@DomaineNico
@LaPostavineyards
This was so inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!
Dr Laura Catena Of Catena Zapata: Five Strategies Our Company Is Using To Tackle Climate Change &… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.