> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://www.thecellarjournal.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # Austria's Vineyard Classification Is Moving Toward Law. The ÖTW Has Chosen Its Next Chairman. - URL: https://www.thecellarjournal.com/austrias-vineyard-classification-is-moving-toward-law-the-otw-has-chosen-its-next-chairman/ - Published: 2026-09-08T19:16:58.000Z - Updated: 2026-09-08T19:21:44.000Z - Description: Michael Malat will succeed Michael Moosbrugger as ÖTW chairman in 2027, as Austria moves vineyard classification toward national law. His challenge is to expand the system's authority without weakening the transparency that gave it credibility. - Author: Pedro Fadanelli - Tags: #en, Dispatches Michael Malat will succeed Michael Moosbrugger in 2027\. The task is no longer to prove the idea of Erste Lage, but to protect its credibility as private judgment moves toward public authority. **What happened** Michael Malat will become chairman of the Österreichische Traditionsweingüter, or ÖTW, at the beginning of 2027\. Michael Moosbrugger will remain in office until the end of 2026, completing almost twenty years at the head of Austria's most influential private association for vineyard classification. The transition is planned, not abrupt. Malat has served on the ÖTW board for around two decades and has chaired its Donauraum regional organisation since 2022\. His father, Gerald Malat, was one of the association's founders in 1991\. The announcement therefore signals continuity more than a change of ideology. Its timing makes it significant. The ÖTW is moving from the long work of identifying and explaining important vineyard sites toward a more political phase. Austria created the legal basis for a national classification in 2023, while the association now says further recognition is included in a draft wine law expected to take effect in autumn 2027. **What Moosbrugger built** When Moosbrugger became chairman in 2007, the ÖTW had approximately 25 member estates. It now reports 91 wineries across eight regions in Lower Austria and Vienna, farming about 3,600 hectares, close to eight percent of Austria's vineyard area. Its private system currently recognises 145 sites as ÖTW Erste Lage. The expansion is geographical as well as institutional. An initiative rooted in Kamptal and Kremstal now includes Traisental, Wagram, Carnuntum, Thermenregion, Weinviertel and Vienna. The Single Vineyard Summit, created in 2013, has become its international stage. The 2026 edition brings together 556 wines from 170 wineries, including producers affiliated with ÖTW, STK, Vinea Wachau and Burgenland. Moosbrugger's central legacy is not a list of famous vineyards. It is the attempt to make origin govern the hierarchy of Austrian wine. In a country with 18 DAC appellations, around 900 local names and roughly 4,300 registered vineyard names, classification is presented as a way to make a complex geography legible beyond Austria. **How the ÖTW classification works** The ÖTW does not claim that geology alone can identify a superior site. Its methodology combines historical, physical, economic and qualitative evidence. It considers when a vineyard was first recorded and marketed by name, the consistency of its geology, climate and exposition, the number of producers working there, export representation, prices, external expert assessments and blind tastings conducted by members. These factors are combined into what the association calls classification strength. The system also limits the potential scale of each tier, with Erste Lage intended to cover around 15 percent of a region's vineyard area and Grosse Lage around five percent. ÖTW says Erste Lage evaluation should be observed over 15 to 20 years, while it has set a five-to-ten-year evaluation period for the Grosse Lage category. That emphasis on time is essential. A single successful vintage cannot establish the standing of a site. The classification is meant to measure whether different producers, seasons and market conditions repeatedly support the same conclusion. **Private authority is not the same as national law** Austria's 2023 Wine Law Collective Decree created a legal framework for Erste Lage and Grosse Lage, but it did not simply convert the ÖTW's 145 sites into a national list. Each participating region must develop a proposal through its Regional Wine Committee. The National Wine Committee reviews it, and final recognition requires a ministerial decree. The framework applies only to DAC wines from classified vineyards. It requires hand harvesting, lower maximum yields and release no earlier than one year after harvest. A site can first become Erste Lage and must hold that status for at least five years before it can be considered for Grosse Lage. Regions are not required to classify their vineyards. This distinction is the central issue of the succession. The ÖTW supplied much of the intellectual and practical model, but a public classification must also work for producers outside the association. It needs a transparent path for nomination, evidence, approval, review and appeal. The authority of the law cannot rest only on the reputation of the group that inspired it. **What Malat is taking on** Malat runs his family's estate in Furth bei Göttweig, founded in 1722, and represents its tenth generation. He has led the winery since 2008\. His long board service means that he inherits the ÖTW's decisions rather than arriving as an outsider asked to redesign them. The priorities announced for his chairmanship are international visibility, clearer communication, new formats and a wider distribution of responsibility among members. Defined portfolios are expected to allow members to lead individual projects, with Markus Huber serving as deputy chairman and Michael Tischler-Zimmermann continuing as managing director. Those goals are organisational, not yet policy. No new classification rules, regional timetable or list of candidates has been announced. The first test of Malat's leadership will be whether greater visibility is accompanied by greater clarity about how private ÖTW judgments relate to the official national process. **What is confirmed** Moosbrugger will complete his term at the end of 2026 and Malat will assume the national chair at the beginning of 2027\. The ÖTW reports 91 members, eight regions, approximately 3,600 hectares and 145 ÖTW Erste Lage sites. Austria established the legal foundation for a national two-tier vineyard classification in 2023\. The association says a further draft wine law is expected to take effect in autumn 2027\. That timetable remains an expectation attached to legislation still in draft form. **What remains unclear** The announcement does not explain which ÖTW sites, if any, will be proposed first under the national process, how regional committees will reconcile different private systems, or when the first legally recognised Erste Lage wines will reach the market. It also does not define how non-member producers will participate in the evidence-gathering process, how conflicts of interest will be handled, how decisions can be challenged, or how sites may later be removed or reassessed. Malat has promised wider responsibility and stronger international communication, but no measurable programme, budget, market priorities or governance changes have yet been published. **TCJ View** This is a relevant succession because Moosbrugger leaves behind more than an association. He helped turn the vineyard into the organising language of modern Austrian wine and built a methodology patient enough to observe a site across producers and vintages. Malat inherits a harder assignment. Private classifications can advance through persuasion and the agreement of members. A legal classification distributes economic value across an entire region. It affects who may use a prestigious term, which vineyards gain visibility and how producers outside the founding group are treated. The ÖTW's history gives it authority, but authority is not the same as neutrality. The closer its model moves to law, the more the system must explain who decides, which evidence prevails and how disagreement is resolved. The next phase should therefore be judged less by the number of new classified sites than by the credibility of the process around them. Moosbrugger spent two decades proving that vineyard hierarchy could be built carefully. Malat now has to show that it can become broader without becoming less transparent. **Sources** [Wein.plus: Michael Malat becomes new chairman of the ÖTW, September 2026](https://magazine.wein.plus/news/michael-malat-becomes-new-chairman-of-the-oetw-michael-moosbrugger-resigns-after-20-years?ref=thecellarjournal.com)[ Wine+Partners: ÖTW leadership transition, association scale and stated priorities, September 2, 2026](https://wine-partners.at/en/news/new-chair-oetw?ref=thecellarjournal.com)[ Österreichische Traditionsweingüter: vineyard-classification methodology, criteria and evaluation periods](https://www.oetw.at/en/journal/wer-entscheidet-was-eine-erste-lage-ist?ref=thecellarjournal.com)[ Österreichische Traditionsweingüter: purpose and international role of vineyard classification](https://www.oetw.at/en/journal/braucht-man-eine-lagenklassifizierung?ref=thecellarjournal.com)[ Austrian Wine: legal basis for Erste Lage and Grosse Lage, August 2023](https://www.austrianwine.com/press-media/news/news-2025/article/austria-defines-the-legal-basis-for-an-official-vineyard-classification-system?ref=thecellarjournal.com)[ Republic of Austria: Wine Law Collective Decree 2023](https://www.ris.bka.gv.at/Dokumente/BgblAuth/BGBLA%5F2023%5FII%5F191/BGBLA%5F2023%5FII%5F191.html?ref=thecellarjournal.com)[ Wine+Partners: national classification process and committee structure, August 21, 2023](https://wine-partners.at/en/news/otw-site-classification?ref=thecellarjournal.com)