Published: Monday, April 02, 2012, 3:30 PM     Updated: Monday, April 02, 2012, 3:37 PM

By PAUL VIGNA, The Patriot-News

How much wine are we consuming as a country? Jim Tresize, in his latest e-letter for the New York Grape & Wine Foundation, published these figures:

U.S. wine sales last year totaled 347 million cases, a 5.3% increase from 2010, and had a retail value estimated at $32.5 billion, according to Jon Fredrikson of Gomberg, Fredrikson & Associates in California. The United States remains the world’s largest wine market, but when you measure adult per capita consumption around the world, we’re No. 59–after Greenland, Iceland, and Niue (where’s that?). We remain an uncivilized country when it comes to wine consumption.