A shrinking market share

In 1990, rhums market share was down to 5% on the French spirit market¹.
Rums have a 11% share of the worldwide spirit market and are the third most sold spirit just behind whisky and brandy. On the other hand, it is the best selling spirit in its category of clear spirits, followed by vodka and gin.
20% of the rum world production is sold on European markets.
For many years, rhum agricole has been facing two major difficulties:

• a shrinking market share in France as spirit volumes are increasing.
• a harsh competition in the rum market segment from traditional rums (molasse rums) with cheaper labour and raw material costs.

French sales has been divided by a factor 2 in 20 years, slipping from the equivalent of 135'000 hectolitres of pure alcohol (H.P.A.) in 1970 to 70'000 H.P.A. in 1990¹. Meanwhile, spirit sales increased from 850'900 H.P.A. in 1965 to 1'420'000 H.P.A. in 1990.

Bringing forward its specificity

Martinique rhum agricole is more expensive to produce, due to the high cost of labour in Martinique, compared to neighbouring countries such as Jamaica, Cuba or Brazil. Molasses being by products and requiring less care in handling are also cheaper raw materials compared to fresh sugar cane juice.
To protect Martinique rhum agricole, producers worked on creating an high end image for their product. The higher range perception would explain the higher price of Martinique rhum agricole in consumer's minds.
The decision to seek an A.O.C was made as early as 1975². The A.O.C's purpose was to extend the legal protection entitled to rums produced in French overseas regions.
The A.O.C request did not succeed for technical reasons on its first attempt and in 1989 the FENARUM (National Federation of Rhum Producers) filled another request.
In 1993, an expert committee is designed to write the AOC specifications. This committee defined geographical limits for cane cultivation and standard production techniques (distillation columns, ageing, fermentation, ...) to caracterise the rhum agricole product.
As it is the case in most AOC specifications, these limitations were intended to include most current production caracteristics to ensure that rhum would always be produced the same way in the future.

Publication of the A.O.C. decree

In France, all laws and decrees as well as official texts are published in the Journal Officiel (equivalent to the London Gazette in the UK or the Federal Register in the US). The AOC decree enacting the AOC has been signed on November, 5 1996. It has been published in the Journal Officiel dated November, 8 1996 starting at page n° 16360. You can access the three pages of the decree:

• Download page 1 of the 1996 decree (French).
• Download page 2 of the 1996 decree (French).
• Download page 3 of the 1996 decree (French).

AOC system description.

Appellation d'Origine Contrôlée (AOC) is the French equivalent to EU's Protected Designation of Origin (PDO).

Protected Designation of Origin (PDO) is one of the geographical indications defined in European Union law to protect the names of regional foods. The law ensures that only products genuinely originating in that region are allowed in commerce as such. The purpose of the law is to protect the reputation of the regional foods and eliminate the unfair competition and misleading of consumers by non-genuine products, which may be of inferior quality or of different flavour.

Definition adapted from a Wikipedia article

A defined geographical area.

To be labeled "AOC Martinique Rhum agricole" rum has to be produced from cane grown in an area authorized by the AOC decree.
Currently, only the territories of the following 23 municipalities of Martinique are allowed for the cultivation of sugarcane intended for the production of AOC Martinique rhum agricole:

• Fort-de-France area : municipalities of "Le Carbet", "Fort-de-France", "Le Lamentin", "Saint-Joseph" and "Saint-Pierre".
• La Trinité area : municipalities of "Basse-Pointe", "Gros-Morne", "Le Lorrain", "Macouba", "Le Marigot", "Le Robert", "Sainte-Marie" and "La Trinité".
• Le Marin area : municipalities of "Le Diamant", "Ducos, "Le François", "Le Marin", "Rivière-Pilote", "Rivière-Salée", "Saint-Esprit", "Sainte-Luce", "Les Trois-Ilets" and "Le Vauclin".