CMB 2018: China the Superpower of Wines of Future

A very optimistic Baudouin Havaux, Chairman of the Concours Mondial de Bruxelles (CMB) believes the quality is also improving fast “Our children will drink top quality Chinese wines. China is the most dynamic wine market and its wines are gradually gaining in prestige. A country once famous for tea-drinking, China may soon become one of the world’s largest global wine consumers. And what consumers in the world’s second-largest economy want, is premium quality wine”, he says.

Statistics of Chinese wines at CMB

For two consecutive years, in 2016 and 2017, China entered the highest number of samples in the €35 – 50 price rangein the CMB, outnumbering entries by Spain (22), France (14) and even Italy (12). In 2017, Chinese entries topped the list in the € 50 to 70 price category together with Spain, and were the undisputed leaders with 11 entries in the €70 + category. Nearly a quarter of all samples in the higher price categories entered in the Concours Mondial in 2017 were from China. And nearly a third of these entries were awarded a medal by the judging panel.

The country fared well in all wine categories. In 2017, it ranked 6th for the number of medals, following traditional wine producing countries like Spain, France, Italy, Portugal and Chile, but ahead of South Africa and Greece. The number of Grand Gold Medals awarded to Chinese wines increased 3 times from 2016 to 2017. Last year, for the first time, a Chinese wine was included in the prestigious CMB List of Revelations.

Here are the latest developments in Chinese wine production:

Wine Production in China

China is a major player in the wine industry; poised to play a prominent role in the global wine market. Though some sources claim that the first Chinese winery was set up in Eastern Shandong province in 1892, it was not until the mid-1980s that the wine industry in China took off.

China could outdo many better-known producer countries when it comes to the length of its viticulture history. The earliest known Chinese grape wine dates from the Neolithic era, according to evidence discovered at the Jiahu site in Henan Province. The domestication of vines in China began in around 1046-256 BC. During the Han Dynasty, vitis vinifera was introduced to China from central Asia in Shaanxi Province, near modern-day Xi’an. Despite and throughout this long- standing history, the Chinese never developed a strong taste for grape wine. And the first modern winery – Changyu in Shandong Province – would not open until 1892.

 China has been fast making up for lost time and currently boasts of having the 2nd largest surface area under vine in the world with 847,000 ha of vineyards (Spain leads the way followed by France in 3rd place). According to the International Organisation of Vine and Wine (OIV), China’s vineyard area continues to increase 17,000 ha between 2015 and 2016, making it “the main growth area of vineyards worldwide”. China is the 5th biggest wine consuming country (preceded by the USA, France, Italy and Germany), the 5th largest global importer of wine in terms of volume, and the 4th biggest global importer by value (closing in on Germany). Chinese domestic demand is “the biggest contributory factor to trade growth”.

Currently, the most popular red varietal is Cabernet-Sauvignon and the most common white is Chardonnay. (This is in contrast to the ABC wine lovers- Anything But Chardonnay-editor). More than 80% of all wine produced is red.,

Indigenous varieties

However, China has small quantities of several unique grape varieties grown for wine production. These include several hybrid grapes that are crosses between Chinese and European or American grapes first brought to China by Western missionaries. Approximately 39 wild grape strains also exist in China, some of which have been grown in other countries. Names such as: Longyan or Dragon’s Eye, Shuanghong, Beihong, Beimei, Beibinghong and Gongzhubai  may not yet be familiar to wine drinkers globally, but they may rise to prominence in the future. The country also grows the Kyoho grape, primarily for food but sometimes also used to make wine in China, whilst the Hutai grape is used to make ice wine in Shaanxi Province.

Our expert’s View Point

John Salvi MW is one of the oldest, legendry Masters of Wine in the world, who are still very active in the field of wine. In fact he has done a few vintages as a winemaker in China till last year and it gave him plenty of insight into the Chinese wine industry. He says ‘to-date there are still very few Chinese wines of serious quality.  I have done my best to make better and finer wine at Château Balboa in Xinjiang but the two best wines in China are still Grace Vineyards and Silver Heights.’

In China, apart from the biggest cities like Beijing and Shanghai, the Chinese drink wine in the Provinces that produce wine. In the other Provinces wine consumption is very small and most people drink Baijiu, a local popular drink that Chinese still prefer.

The potential remains enormous, says John Salvi.  Many people think that Ningxia is the ideal locality because of the Yellow River and the mountains, but China is vast and there is good probability that better locations still to be discovered.  LVMH started to make Sparkling wine in Ningxia in 2013 and Laffite have planted a vineyard in Shandong, but neither has so far produced great wine or been satisfied with what they have produced.  Humidity in the East, extreme climate in the west, poor rootstock and inexperience are the main stumbling blocks.

China WILL eventually make some great wine

It is important to take all statistics with caution as none are reliable and few are available.  Of the supposed nearly 800,000 hectares a large proportion is for table grapes and an even larger proportion for grape juice.  The vineyard area devoted to wine is impossible to ascertain and anyway a lot of the table grapes are used for wine and wine grapes for grape juice.

Some of the vineyard equipment is state- of the- art and there is no lack of money being poured into wine production.  Top oenologists from overseas are being employed and eventually a great wine will be produced. China has no autochthonous grape varieties ‘per se’ but recently some crosses have been made that supposedly can support the -28°C temperatures in Xinjiang, but the results so far have been totally undrinkable!!

Salvi goes a step further in qualifying the statement by Havaux about the state of wine economy. He says the entire scene in China is ultra-dynamic... but there is a very long way to go!

Here are a few Articles that are related:

CMB 2017: Successful Concours Mondial to visit China in 2018

Vintage in Xinjiang 2015

Counterfeiting Wine in China on the Increase

Subhash Arora

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