| A controlling stake in the most famous Russian producer of sparkling wines, CJSC Agrofirma Abrau-Durso (Krasnodar Territory), which belonged to the state, was transferred to trust management for a period of 49 years to the Chelyabinsk company Ariant. In addition, reports appeared in the local press that Ariant bought a fairly large number of shares from the former shareholders of Abrau-Durso and established almost complete control over the agricultural company.
After the deal to acquire Abrau-Durso, the Ariant holding, the main owner of which is Alexander Aristov, a member of the Federation Council of Russia, can become the absolute leader in the domestic wine materials market. Ariant's share in the production of grape wines will increase from 50% to 80%. The company is now able to produce up to 2.6 million bottles of wine monthly, including about 500 thousand bottles of champagne of the famous Abrau-Durso brand.
“Ariant” has been known in Kuban since 2001. Then Chelyabinsk residents bought shares of local wineries from residents of villages and villages of the Taman region for cash. At first, this fact caused a storm of indignation in the regional press, but soon the criticism stopped, which gave rise to assumptions that the Ariant management was able to come to an agreement with the regional administration. Today, Ariant, according to the Expert-Ural magazine, owns seven of the largest wine-making agricultural firms in Taman. These include vineyards and wineries.
Now, the Abrau-Durso agricultural firm has been added to the Taman possessions of Arianta, which has recently been eking out a miserable existence. The catastrophic situation at the enterprise was explained primarily by a series of natural disasters that swept through the region in 2001-2002 (mudflows washed away vineyards, flood waters flooded factory floors). But residents of the village of Abrau-Dyurso, as reported by Novorossiyskaya Respublika, are confident that the elements had nothing to do with it: their agricultural company was deliberately bankrupted in order to be transferred later “into reliable hands.” It is interesting that in Kuban the deal to transfer Abrau-Durso to Ariant is shrouded in secrecy; few people know about it, even in the agricultural company itself. Both the viticulture committee of the regional administration and the management of the Abrau-Durso agricultural company refused to comment on the situation with the “champagne redistribution” to journalists. Igor GLANIN, Krasnodar region
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