The golden Flavescence is a quarantine disease (European Directive 2000/29 / EC) particularly contagious among the grapevines. Present in most wine-growing areas in southern Europe, it can be the source of heavy crop losses and compromise the sustainability of vineyards.

This disease is caused by the phytoplasma of Flavescence dorée: a small, wallless bacteria of the Mollicutes class. It is transmitted by an insect vector, the leafhopper Scaphoideus titanus, as well as by grafting. The leafhopper was accidentally imported from North America into the southwestern vineyard at the turn of the last century and quickly adapted and spread in France to Corsica, then spread to Italy, Switzerland and all. southern Europe.

As a quarantine disease, Flavescence dorée is subject to a regulated and compulsory control. To date, the disease is present in Spain, France (Aquitaine, Burgundy, Corsica, Languedoc-Roussillon, Midi-Pyrénées, Poitou-Charentes, Rhône-Alpes, PACA region), Italy, Portugal, Switzerland, Slovenia and Serbia.