hUNGARiAN AGRicUltURAl RESEARch

Kozma, P., 1 Werner, J., 1 Forgács, B. 1
Evaluation and clone selection of ‘Hungarica’
grapevine cultivars to increase the range of choice
of grape varieties for quality wine production
Figure 1: Csókaszôlô
Old ‘Hungarica’ grapevine varieties
still play a decisive role in
Hungarian viticulture. These
varieties include those autochthonous
in the Carpathian basin,
naturalized in Hungary or developed
by successful Hungarian grape
breeders.
The majority of white and red
wine varieties cultivated on large
areas in Hungary are ‘Hungarica’
grapes. Kékfrankos is the grapevine
cultivar grown on the largest
area in the country, followed by
the white wine variety Olasz
rizling. There has been a great
upsurge in the propagation of
international (premium) varieties
from 1990 as emphasis was placed
on the production of quality wines.
In order to achieve success, every
wine region aims at offering
products of supreme quality and,
in order to create their own image,
having special products with
unique characteristics. Since land
race cultivars provide an option to
accomplish this goal, the demand
has increased for old cultivars
already withdrawn from cultivation
and major Hungarian land
race and regional varieties still
grown in the country. In the past,
almost all the varieties cultivated
in Hungary were of the type
Pontus which are sensitive to
weather conditions and have
special needs, making them
unsuitable for mass production.
These varieties were unable to
perform well in machinecultivated
plantations with wide
row spacing and low plant density,
and as a consequence their
cultivation was abandoned or
reduced to a minor area.
The grape gene bank
established by the Research
Institute for Viticulture and
Oenology of the University of
Pécs, which is one of the world’s
largest grape gene banks, stores
nearly 1400 items (wild species,
varieties, clones, breeding
materials). The Institute managed
to collect old grapevine varieties in
the 1950s before they disappeared
from the vineyards. The candidate
varieties of the main cultivars
selected during grapevine variety
research and clone selection as
Photo: János Werner
well as the diversity revealed
during these trials were
successfully preserved.
Reintroduction of old
‘Hungarica’ grape varieties into
cultivation
The old cultivars of the
Carpathian basin stored in the
Institute’s gene bank were reevaluated
during 1998–2001 to
determine which of them are able
to meet the requirements of quality
production and thus appropriate
for being reintroduced into
cultivation under the present
conditions. Research is being
carried out to assess the 104 old
1 Research Institute for Viticulture and Oenology, University of Pécs
Hungarian Agricultural Research 2009/3–4 25