The ”Ruta del vino de Gran Canaria”

Here we present the "Ruta del vino de Gran Canaria" as a cultural project that aims to: a) make perceivable the work of the winegrowers; b) exploit the value of the wine produced on the island, and c) preserve the island's wine cultural heritage and make it profitable. The process to realize the “Ruta” is based on two pillars already presented by the authors at previous CERVIM conferences: the first is Landscapital i.e. the landscape as a means of production; the second is the mapping of the productive viticultural landscape of Gran Canaria with heroic viticultural practices. The project started in 2017 promoted by the Council of the Primary Sector and Food Sovereignty of the Cabildo de Gran Canaria and its process is developed to 2019 from 2020 thanks to LEADER funding. The “Ruta” has been certified in 2021 and now involves 72 partners related to the wine culture and promotion for a total vine-growing area of 210 hectares scattered all over the island. These numbers provide an agile measure of the landscape fragmentation and reflect the "structural" difficulty to cultivate. To overcome such difficulties, the vine growers developed inventive agronomic practices that integrated into the cultural heritage of the island. These characteristics are reflected in its unique viticultural landscape illustrated by the vine-growers and the wine-makers of the ¨Ruta". And, to make this link between culture, landscape, and wine even more significant, the motto "Hacemos vinos y embotellamos paisajes" (We produce wines and we put the landscape in the bottle) was coined. To conclude, we believe that the theoretical foundations found in the "Ruta del Vino de Gran Canaria" can be profitably used to enhance wine production, preserve the traditional viticultural landscape and raise awareness of the high-quality products of the island's primary sector