Odesa: a grain port, not a wine port
Why the Odesa hub, contrary to expectation, had little to do with wine, and what that means for the region's history.
Anyone looking for a wine capital in Odesa will be disappointed, and that in itself is a finding worth stating.
Odesa's Jewish economy was distinguished by the role Jews played in grain export through the harbour, in wholesale trade, banking and industry. It was grain, not wine, around which the capital, the brokerage and the logistics were built.
Entry into that trade came from below. In the first half of the nineteenth century Jewish participation in grain export was confined to buying in villages and on estates and to brokerage as subagents for the large Greek, Italian and French export houses. By 1838 Jews were well represented among the exporters themselves.
The community was large: in 1897 the city held 138,935 Jews out of 403,815 residents, more than a third of the population. By 1910 Jews owned 56% of the small shops and made up 63% of the city's craftsmen.
The conclusion for wine history cuts two ways. Odesa was an outlet for Bessarabian and Kherson wine, but a hub rather than a producer, and wine was never its specialty. At the same time a city with a community of that size was itself a market for kosher wine, and that, rather than export, is what connects Odesa to the subject.