OIV Recognizes Sémillon Gris as a Grape From South Africa

South Africa has won official international recognition for Sémillon Gris as a separate grape variety, with the International Organisation of Vine and Wine, or OIV, certifying the grape and naming South Africa as its country of origin.

The decision gives formal status to a grape that has been present in the Cape for centuries but had not previously been recognized as its own certified variety in international records. Sémillon Gris is a pink-skinned natural mutation of Sémillon Blanc. Producers and researchers in South Africa say it appears to be largely unique to the country in registered form, even though there have been anecdotal reports of vines in places such as Australia, California and possibly Bordeaux.

The recognition follows more than a decade of work by Andrea and Chris Mullineux of Mullineux & Leeu Family Wines, who pushed for formal certification while working with South African regulators and plant health authorities. Andrea Mullineux told Decanter that the process was unusually difficult because there was no established system for certifying a long-standing local mutation that was not being introduced through the normal import and quarantine route used for foreign varieties.

Cuttings from a 1960 vineyard in Paardeberg were taken in 2012 and treated through in vitro thermotherapy to remove pathogens. After that, the plant material was propagated, evaluated and certified. The work led to the establishment of a mother block at the Roundstone estate in Swartland in 2022. That block now provides healthy, certified material that can be planted by growers in South Africa and elsewhere.

The recognition is significant for South African wine because it gives the country a second grape variety it can claim as its own. The first is Pinotage, which was intentionally created in South Africa through crossing Pinot Noir and Cinsault. Sémillon Gris is different. It was not bred by a researcher or planted as a planned cross. It emerged on its own as a spontaneous mutation.

That distinction has made the grape important to growers and researchers, but it has also left many unanswered questions. Scientists at Stellenbosch University are now studying the mutation by exposing cuttings to different stress conditions, including changes in soil pH, ultraviolet light and temperature, while also looking for genetic markers that may explain how the mutation formed and how it behaves in the vineyard.

Some points are already clearer. According to the research cited by Mullineux, the darker grape color is not caused by virus. In fact, virus-free vines produce the deepest color. Researchers have also found that the mutation appears stable when propagated. Sémillon Gris does not revert back to Sémillon Blanc in the next generation of plant material, and it does not seem to depend on extreme vine age to appear or survive.

The grape’s history in the Cape runs deep. Sémillon is believed to have arrived in South Africa in the 1650s, in the earliest period of European settlement and vineyard planting at the Cape. For much of the country’s early wine history, Sémillon was so common that it was often referred to simply as groendruif, or “green grape.” Historical records cited in the Decanter report say that by 1822 Sémillon accounted for 93% of South Africa’s vineyards, after expanding from about one million vines in 1795 to 22 million.

In that period, white Sémillon and the pink-skinned form that would later be identified as Sémillon Gris were often not treated as distinct grapes. They were interplanted, harvested together and crushed together. Historical references also suggest that rooi groendruif, or “red green grape,” may at times have been more common than the white form in some vineyards.

That broad presence did not last. The phylloxera epidemic, which devastated vineyards in many wine regions in the late 19th century, sharply reduced South Africa’s old plantings. Sémillon lost much of its previous dominance. By 1979, it represented just 3.4% of the national vineyard area, and Sémillon Gris was not even listed separately in official records.

Today, South Africa has 873.74ha of Sémillon, including plantings of the gris mutation. Industry figures cited in the report say Sémillon Gris will begin to be recorded separately in official vineyard statistics from 2027, another sign that its status is moving from historical curiosity to fully defined category.

Part of the grape’s modern reputation has come from its survival in scattered old vineyards, especially in the Swartland and Franschhoek areas. Producers have identified Sémillon Gris in several historic blocks, including vines in old field blends and vineyards planted in the early and mid-20th century. For years, that pattern helped create a belief that the mutation belonged mainly to old vines. That idea was later challenged when viticulturist Franziska Wickens planted a younger vineyard from propagated material in 2013, showing the mutation could be carried into new plantings rather than only discovered in old ones.

The push for official status also has practical effects for growers and winemakers. Certification means nurseries and vineyards can work with clean, traceable planting material. It also gives producers a clear legal and administrative path to bottle and market the wine under the correct variety name. Before that, the grape existed in a gray area: known by some growers, present in historic vineyards, but without the full international recognition that supports formal registration and wider planting.

Mullineux & Leeu Family Wines has already been making wine from the grape. The company first produced a wine called The Gris in 2013 from the old Paardeberg vineyard that became central to the certification effort. It has since also made wine from the Roundstone mother block, although production remains small. According to the Decanter report, fruit from those vines is expected to continue going into a white blend from the estate as well as into limited varietal bottlings.

For South Africa, the recognition ties modern research and regulation to a much older vineyard story. It also gives local producers a stronger claim over a grape that had long been part of the Cape landscape but was rarely counted on its own. With certified material now available, further planting is likely to depend on grower interest, market demand and the results of ongoing research into how Sémillon Gris performs in different soils and climates.