EU MAY DROP BAN ON SUGARED WINE

EU Farm Commissioner Mariann Fischer Boel said this week that a ban on adding sugar to wine, a key part of planned reforms to the EU wine sector, may be amended, the Associated Press reports. Northern countries including Germany, Austria, Luxembourg and the Czech Republic strongly oppose the reform, which Fischer Boel says she is well aware of.

"There has been a huge row about this, and I haven't blocked my ears to this ... but a status quo does hold a genuine problem," Fischer Boel told the European Parliament, which was to vote on the draft reform on Wednesday.

The EU hopes to agree on the proposed reforms by the end of the year, although most of the proposals have yet to be settled.