On the morning of April 15, at the Ministry of Agriculture and Environment, the Central OCOP product evaluation and classification council (one product per village) announced OCOP products meeting 5-star standards nationwide in 2025.
Among the 40 5-star OCOP products announced this time, Quang Ninh has 8 products, including purple ba kich wine soaked in the sea of Ha Long Bay.
The pilot project of bringing bottles of wine soaked onto the bottom of Ha Long Bay has been implemented since 2018 and has achieved satisfactory success, especially with the external shape of the bottle, with barnacles clinging tightly, creating beautiful and interesting designs.
Initially, people who brought wine soaked in Ha Long Bay only thought it was a hobby, but later many people became interested and bought it to drink and give as gifts, so they decided to turn it into a unique commercial product of Ha Long Bay.
However, bringing the wine bottles to the bottom of Ha Long Bay, as well as the process of handling them after picking them up, is extremely elaborate.
To protect alcohol, limit water pressure and avoid encroachment through bottle caps, all bottle caps are reinforced with many layers of rubber and silicone.
On average, each soaking batch usually lasts from 9-12 months. However, if not used immediately, they are brought back to soak in a shallower location, considered as a form of natural preservation.
The process of soaking in the bottom of Ha Long Bay sometimes also encounters risks, such as broken bottles or being swept away. In particular, during the 2024 Yagi storm, hundreds of bottles of wine were swept away by the storm.
The processing of wine bottles after being picked up ashore to bring them to the market is also very elaborate and time-consuming.
First, wash the dirty residue attached to the bottle, then soak the whole bottle in industrial alcohol 2 times for about 4-5 days to treat the intestines of the barnacles attached around the bottle.
Then, bring those bottles into a cooling room and drain the bottle shells before proceeding with disinfection. The next step is to seal the bottle around the film before putting it in the refrigerator for storage. The entire process of processing a bottle of wine, from being brought ashore to putting it in the refrigerator for storage, usually takes 10–12 days.
To date, tens of thousands of bottles of all kinds of wine have been successfully soaked under the bottom of Ha Long Bay.
