Approximately 17,000 visitors took part in the National Wine Day this year, as against about 100,000 the previous years. Almost 40 wine producers participated in the celebration the last years, but this year the figure was four times lower, IPN reports.

This year the holiday was hosted by ten wineries and the Association of Small Wine Producers. About 15,000 bottles of wine were sold during the two-day festivities. “During a very short period of time, we managed to organize the wine holiday in a new format. As many as 9,200 promotional bottles of wine, with the symbol “Welcome to Moldova”, were distributed at the Chisinau airport. Thirteen buses and 11 minibuses transported gratis about 3,000 people to wineries during the two days,” said Dumitru Munteanu, director of the National Office of Vine and Wine.

The event organizers said that the same number of foreign tourists as last year visited the country this year, despite the forecasts that the change of the celebration’s format will lead to a decline in this number. “More than 2,500 national and foreign tourists visited Butuceni and Orheiul Vechi. We didn’t expect so many tourists. The organization of transport was the most difficult aspect. All the other parts were staged very well. Some of the wineries didn’t stop the production process and the people could see all the production stages,” said Ion Luca, chairman of the Association of Small Wine Producers of Moldova.

The National Wine Day was held on October 3-4. The event was decentralized, being organized in 11 locations. In Chisinau, the festival “Tulburel” (“New Thick Wine”) was staged at the Exhibitions Center “Moldexpo”.