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(Image credit: Coombsville AVA, Napa Valley)

Napa Valley winemakers can expect better legal protection for their wines in Singapore and South Korea after the countries passed a ruling to make copycats illegal.

Singapore and South Korea said they would legally recognise the Napa Valley appellation as the exclusive preserve of Napa wines. Both countries are important emerging markets for wine in Asia.

Pat Stotesbery, chairman of the NVV’s Napa Name Protection Committee and owner of Ladera Vineyards, said, ‘Our goal is to ensure that when a consumer enjoys a bottle of wine with ‘Napa Valley’ on the label, they can be confident that the quality and excellence the Napa Valley stands for is contained within.’

South Korea and Singapore were among the top 10 export markets for Californian wines in 2015, accounting for $23m and $15m of exports respectively, according to the California Wine Exports Report 2015.

In recent years, the NVV has secured protected status for the Napa Valley name in Israel, Turkey, Brazil, India, Australia, New Zealand, Norway, Canada and Taiwan.

It was also the first wine region in the world to earn Geographic Indication (GI) status in China, in 2012.

Napa Valley is one of smallest wine regions in the world and 95% of its wineries are family owned.

Editing by Chris Mercer.

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Laura Seal
Laura Seal
Decanter Magazine, Food, Wine & Travel Writer

Laura Seal is a freelance food, wine and travel writer based in London, but travelling regularly to Spain.

Besides writing travel guides, learning content and news stories for Decanter, she has also contributed to Country Life and US-based Food&Wine Magazine.

After graduating from UCL with an English Literature & Language degree in 2016, she joined Decanter as editorial and digital assistant. In 2017 she was promoted to the role of content creator on the digital team.

She worked with the Decanter design team to produce the much-loved ‘Tasting Notes Decoded’ series, which is published on Decanter.com and serialised in the magazine.

In addition, she compiles the 'A month in wine' feature for Decanter Magazine and formerly worked on MarketWatch.