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Tequila, a distillate from the blue agave plant
Given the global success of Margarita, it follows that tequila itself has also become a star. Served neat or on ice, this spirit made from a distillate of blue agave (Agave tequiliana), has fueled the market for such top-selling premium brands as Jose Cuervo and Patrón. A whole host of celebrities too have jumped on the tequila bandwagon, offering their own labels. These include actor George Clooney with his Casamigos; guitar virtuoso Carlos Santana with his Casa Noble; and basketball star Michael Jordan with his Concoro. Even the modern icon, Taylor Swift, was photographed recently while drinking a can of Casa Azyla Tequila soda. With such star power behind the spirit, what better marketing is there?
Protected designation of origin and tequila export
To nobody’s surprise, therefore, tequila exports from Mexico rose by 2.4 percent in 2023, reaching 420 million liters, according to the Consejo Regulador de Tequila (CRT), the Tequila Regulatory Council. This follows a 2022 export volume of 416 million liters, which was also a historic record year for the industry. According to a tequila market summary published by Yahoo!Finance, the global 2023 tequila market was valued at roughly USD 5.637 billion and is expected to reach almost USD 8 billion by 2030. Given this projected rise in demand, can the tequila distilleries keep up with supplies? This brings us to the inevitable question of the prospects for the spirit’s unique agricultural raw material, the blue agave, on which the entire industry relies.
A peasant using a specialized “coa” tool to trim agave leavesA spirit defined by terroir
The blue agave favors rich and sandy soils, as well as altitudes of more than 1,500 meters. It thrives in many subtropical regions of Mexico and even in parts of Arizona, California, Hawaii, and New Mexico. However, for a spirit made from the plant to be considered authentic, Mexican law dictates that it be produced only from blue agave plants cultivated in five Mexican states: Jalisco, Guanajuato, Michoacán, Nayarit, and Tamaulipas. The liquor takes its name from the town of Tequila in Jalisco and its eponymous Tequila Volcano around which the plant flourishes particularly well. The Mexican Tequila Regulatory Council certifies two types of tequila: “Tequila 100% de Agave” and “Tequila Mixto.” The latter must be made from at least 51% pressed blue agave, with sugar products usually supplying the rest of the fermentables.
The subtle difference between tequila and mezcal
Tequila must not be confused with another Mexican terroir-based spirit called mezcal, which, according to the Denomination of Origin for Mezcal (DOM) can only be produced in the states of Oaxaca, Guerrero, Guanajuato, Michoacán, Zacatecas, San Luís Potosí, Tamaulipas, Durango, and Puebla.
And while tequila can only be made with blue agave, mezcal can be distilled from the juice of any agave. Of the 20 or so varieties that are widely used, the most common is Espadin (Agave angustifolia), an ancestor of the blue agave. Therefore, while all tequilas are mezcals, not all mezcals are tequilas, much like bourbon is a whiskey, but not all whiskeys are bourbons. Agave-based spirits made outside of Mexico, on the other hand, may never be called tequila or mezcal.
Agave field in MexicoThe blue agave: An ancient plant in a complex ecosystem
Once considered sacred by indigenous people in pre-Spanish Mexico, the blue agave is a succulent in the family of the Asparagaceae family. It can grow more than 2 meters high and weigh up to about 500 kilograms. Its core is a sugar-rich stem called piña that contains mostly fructose (fruit sugar), a fully fermentable monosaccharide. Importantly, agave flowers need pollinators for reproduction. As a form of extremely specialized symbiosis, these pollinators happen to be exclusively migrating and pregnant female bats of two bat species, the lesser long-nosed bat (Leptonycteris yerbabuenae) and especially the endangered Mexican long-nosed bat (Leptonycteris nivalis).According to Bat Conservation International, the nectar-rich agave flowers provide essential nourishment for the bats, while the flowers, once pollinated, release thousands of seeds that can become new plants. Then the host plants die. Thus, the bats and the agaves are part of a unique ecosystem, in which they are totally dependent on each other for survival.
Can production keep pace with demand?
Until the early 1980s, tequila was but a traditional, artisanal spirit rarely savored outside Mexico; nature kept the delicate agave-bat ecosystem in balance. However, after the “Jimmy Buffet” boom hit, ranchers began to industrialize their processes to meet demand. For maximum yield within their defined geographical areas, they planted vast quantities of genetically similar blue agaves. This left thousands of acres of the succulent with little or no biodiversity. As agave farming became a monoculture, it made entire crops susceptible to devastation should disease strike. While scientists warned of such risks at the time, no action was taken. Climate change was not yet on anybody’s mind.
Effects of climate change on agave cultivation
Sure enough, the inevitable happened in the late 1980s. Agaves began to rot in the field. The causes were pests and diseases collectively referred to in Spanish as TMA (tristeza y muerte de agave, "sadness and death of agave"), which ruined the valuable sugar-filled heads. Then in 1996 and 1997, a climate shift enveloped prime agave growing regions along Mexico’s southwestern coast. According to Rex Dalton in Nature Magazine, “the warmer temperatures and increased rainfall proved devastating for the plants. Pests and diseases and attacked: a bacterium (Erwinia carotovora), a fungus (Fusarium oxysporum), and a weevil (Scyphophorus acupunctatus) were particularly malign, ruining the valuable heads. Ranchers, who must tend fields for years before getting the money from a harvest, were left with unusable agaves. Many decided to cut their losses and abandon agave harvests: by some estimates, the area of planted fields plunged more than 25%.”
Since then, climate change has accelerated and exacerbated the challenges for the blue agave. As Omanjana Goswami, a food and environment scientist with the Union of Concerned Scientists, told CNN in 2023, “the life cycle of agave is too fragile to endure the major weather whiplash the climate crisis is generating.”
Climate change also has a major impact on such species interactions as the symbiosis between flowering agave and migratory bats. As the nectivorous bats feed, they also pick up and disperse pollen to help propagate new plants. With warming temperatures and extreme weather patterns, however, the pollinators which are already considered near extinction are at increased risk of further disruptions. As Bat Conservation International states on its web site, “Connected in birth, life, and death ... Bats and agave have a mutualistic relationship.”
A value more than just tequila
Today, with growing awareness of climate change, conservationists, scientists, farmers, and distillers are teaming up to mitigate the challenges that face both the agaves and the nectivorous bats. This involves developing sustainable strategies to save the bats, restore agave corridors, and support communities in sustainable agricultural and business practices.
This work will do more than save our spirits, both literally and figuratively.
References
1. Baker, Aryn, “Tequilla is About to Become the U.S.’s Most Popular Spirit. That’s bad for the Environment,” Time, 5. May, 2023
2. Bat Conservation International; www.batcom.org
3. Consejo Reuladoe de Tequila (CRT) website: ww.crt.org
4. Desmet, Kobe, “A Quick Guide to Agave Spirits,” moonshineuniversity.com
5. Elton, Charlotte, “Skyrocketing demand, climate change and an endangered bat could threaten your favourite cocktail,” euronews.green, 22. Februar, 2023
6. Gómez-Ruiz, Emma P. & Lacher, Thomas E. Jr., “Climate change, range shifts, and the disruption of a pollinator-plant complex.” Scientific Reports, www.nature.com/scientific reports, September 5, 2019
7. Micallef, Jospeh V., “Tequila’s Next Challenge: Agave Spirits from Australia,” Forbes, 17. November, 2021
8. “Mexico: Tequilla exports to rise by 2.4 percent in 2023”, freshlybottled.com, January 8, 2024
9. Passey, Charles, “Forget tequila and mezcal. Bacanora is now the Mexican spirit you should be drinking,” Market Watch, 21. Januar, 2024
10.Ramirez, Rachel, “Why the climate crisis may be coming for you margarita,” CNN.com, 22. Februar, 2023
11. Smith, Christian, “The most popular cocktail in the U.S. so far in 2023,” The Drinks Business, 14. Februar, 2023
12. Yahoo!Finance, Tequila Market Size, https://finance.yahoo.com/news/tequila-market-size-7944-53-104000051.html
