Institution
CIVB, Conseil Interprofessionnel du Vin de Bordeaux
How to read this
Capitals mark the stressed syllable. “ew” is “ee” said with rounded lips. “ohn” and “an” are nasal vowels: say them through the nose, with no n. The French r comes from the back of the throat. The recording is the reference.
Since the law of August 18, 1948, the growers, négociants (merchants who buy from the châteaux and sell on) and courtiers (brokers, who place the châteaux’ wine with the merchants) of Bordeaux have run their wine trade together in this council, which grew out of a committee of 1943.
The house
The idea came out of the war. In 1943 the regional administration set up a Comité interprofessionnel d’entente et d’étude du vin de Bordeaux. On February 22, 1945 the Commissaire de la République, the state’s representative in liberated Bordeaux, created a first council, which did little. It took real form with a bill brought by Jean-Raymond Guyon, a deputy for the Gironde born in Libourne, who had sold wine before he joined the tax administration in 1926. Adopted on May 14, 1948, the bill led to the law of August 18, 1948, which created the Conseil Interprofessionnel du Vin de Bordeaux.
The law gave it 3 tasks: to link the trade with the public authorities, to ease dealings between growers and merchants, and to promote the wines to the people who drink them. It brought together growers, cooperatives, négociants and courtiers, and it lived on a levy per hectoliter, collected when the permits to move wine were issued. A decree of November 18, 1966 reorganized it. In 1973, the year of a harvest of 5,649,608 hectoliters, the levy raised about 3 million francs. A bill from 4 senators, examined by the Senate in October 1974, set out to give the council more power. Above all it aimed at a security stock of wine, which the council had never had the means to build and finance. The Senate adopted the bill at first reading on October 24, 1974, and a decree of February 16, 1976 reorganized the council again.
Today the CIVB is a private body of public interest, created by law, that studies the market, promotes the Bordeaux appellations and speaks for the trade to the national and European authorities. Its presidency used to pass between the growers and the négoce (the merchant trade of Bordeaux): the négociant Allan Sichel handed it to the grower Bernard Farges at the general assembly of July 7, 2025, for 3 years. On July 6, 2026 the assembly made Philippe Tapie, president of the merchant house Haut Médoc Sélection, co-president beside him until July 2028, when both terms end. It was the first time the council had 2 presidents.
At a glance
- Kind
- Institution
- Based in
- Bordeaux
- Founded
- By the law of August 18, 1948; a first committee in 1943
- Direction
- Bernard Farges and Philippe Tapie, co-presidents since July 2026
Sources
- Books and studies
- Florian Humbert, L’INAO, de ses origines à la fin des années 1960, 2011; Marie-Claude Belis-Bergouignan, Bordeaux Wines: An Archetypal Terroir Cluster?, 2011
- Registers
- Sénat, Raymond Brun, Rapport n° 51 sur la proposition de loi relative aux pouvoirs du Conseil interprofessionnel du vin de Bordeaux, 1974; Conseil Interprofessionnel du Vin de Bordeaux, SIREN 781 846 092 (Annuaire des Entreprises); Assemblée nationale, Sycomore, Jean-Raymond Guyon; Sénat, Proposition de loi relative aux pouvoirs du Conseil interprofessionnel du vin de Bordeaux, texte adopté n° 23, October 24, 1974; Sénat, Projet de loi portant validation de divers décrets instituant des organismes professionnels ou interprofessionnels, texte adopté n° 108, May 12, 1977
- Institutions
- CIVB, Contacts filière vitivinicole des vins de Bordeaux, guide 2020; Bordeaux Négoce, Histoire du vin de Bordeaux
- Press
- Union Girondine des Vins de Bordeaux, Assemblée générale CIVB : Bernard Farges, élu pour 3 ans, 2025; Meininger, Bordeaux erstmals mit Doppelspitze, 2026
Revised October 10, 2026. How I choose sources
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