Vintners Quality Alliance, or
VQA, is a regulatory and
appellation system which guarantees the high quality and authenticity of origin for
Canadian wines made under that system in
British Columbia and
Ontario. It is similar to regulatory systems in
France (
AOC),
Spain (
DO),
Italy (
DOC), and
Germany (
QmP). The VQA system allows for sub-appellations, by which the grapes for wines are sourced from extremely specific geographical locations with different soil and climate. This is in accordance with the concept of
terroir.