Chinese wine in recovery from "anti-extravagance" measures

By Jo Gilbert

Published: 16 June, 2016

China is seeing recovery from government anti-extravagance measures which left deep fissures in the purses of the country's wine market.

China is seeing recovery from government anti-extravagance measures which left deep fissures in the purses of the country's winemakers.

In 2012, the government introduced a crackdown on corporate entertaining and gift-giving aimed at tackling government corruption - and hurt sales of alcohol and luxury brands in the process.

But in 2015, sales of non-grape wine consumption showed signs of recovery, while a growing interest in grape wine - particularly imported still light grape wine - boosted consumption in 2015 (Euromonitor).

The Chinese wine-scape is essentially a tale of two categories: non-grape wine - largely consisting of rice wine - and grape wine.

China is currently seeing dynamic growth in grape wine consumption, due in part to the fact that imported still light grape wines are being competitively priced against the domestic market.

However, despite the growing rise in popularity in grape wine (non-grape wine lost share to still light grape wine in 2015), non-grape wine still accounted for a total volume share of 52%.

China currently has the second largest vineyard surface area worldwide.

And it seems that consumers have a higher acceptance of still red wine than still rosé and still white wine.

The figures support this, with still red wine recording the fastest growth in 2015.

This confidence in red can be seen in the year's new launches, including leading player Yantai Changyu Pioneer Wine Co Ltd's new launch of Cabernet Sauvignon brand, Zuishixian.

In terms of volume, France continues to be the main country of origin for imported grape wine, although the average unit price of French imported grape wine remained at a high level in 2015, only lower than those of the US and Australia.

Australia and Chile are two New World countries that have benefited significantly from the free trade agreement that allows imported grape wine exemption from tariffs until 2019.

Printer friendly version