Australian Wine Industry Overview
Australian Wine Exports
Calendar year 2002 was an exceptional record year in a series of record years for Australian wine exports and was the first year in which export sales surpassed domestic sales. Australian wine exports grew to new records in 2002 with the volume growing 26% over the previous year to reach 471 ML and the value growing 30% to reach $A2.3 billion (see table). Nearly 1.7 million bottles of wine now leave Australia every day supplying 104 international markets.
Red wine sales and exports to the United States were the major drivers of the record growth in 2002. Red wine sales grew 34% and growth of sales to the US were up 53% in volume terms.
The increased availability of red wine in 2002 meant Australian winemakers were better able to meet overseas demand for Australian reds. As a result, red still wine sales were prominent in the growth achieved in 2002. Since first passing white still wine sales in 2000, red still wine sales stretched the margin over white from 20% in 2001 to 31% in 2002.
The significant role of the US in driving sales growth reflects the benefits of recent alliances and joint ventures made by several Australian wine producers with major US interests as well as the competitive, quality-for-value proposition of Australian wine in the US and brand strength. While the United Kingdom is ahead of the United States as Australia's largest overseas market for wine, US sales growth in 2002 closed the gap between the two. In 2001, the US volumes represented 42% of the UK volume; in 2002 the proportion grew to 56%. Moreover, due to a strong increase in the average dollar per litre of the wine sold to the US relative to the UK, the gap between the value of sales to these two markets closed more impressively than it did for volume, with the value of sales to the US in 2001 representing 60% of the value of sales to the UK, but 82% in 2002.
Bottled still wine represented just over 80% by volume of all wine sales in 2002 (see table). Bottled red sales represented almost half of all sales in 2002 and first exceeded bottled white sales in 1997. By 2001, at 173 ML, bottled red sales exceeded bottled white sales by 45 ML - but in 2002, at 231 ML, the gap between bottled red and white jumped to 80 ML. Red wine in containers other than bottles (essentially bulk wine) also grew strongly in 2002, up 39% to reach 42.5 ML, exceeding white sales in containers other than bottles for the first time in the last 10 years (the latter increased 8% to reach 36.7 ML). Overall, the share of still wine in other containers remained constant between the two years at 17%.
The UK continued to be Australia's major overseas destination for wine, at 216 ML in 2002 (46% of the total volume exported) and a value of $A902 million (39% of the total value exported) followed by the US, at 120 ML (25% of the total) and a value of $A741 million (32% of the total). Third place was held by New Zealand in volume terms, at 27 ML (6% of the total) but due to a higher average dollar-per-litre value of sales, Canada held third position in value terms, at $A150 million (7% of the total).
Canada continued to grow as a destination for Australian wine and rivals New Zealand in terms of sales volumes. Canadian consumers stand out in terms of their interest in high quality Australian wine. Among Australia's top 15 markets, the average dollar-per-litre of sales to Canada, at A$6.84 per litre (up 8%) was second only to Singapore. The value of sales to Canada has exceeded the value of sales to New Zealand for three years-the margin stretching to just over 60% in 2002. In contrast, Canada was Australia's fourth biggest market in volume terms behind New Zealand in 2002. Nevertheless, Canada closed the gap to be roughly four-fifths the size of New Zealand in 2002 compared to being just under half its size four years ago.
Exports accounted for 53.2% of total wine sales in Australian during 2002, compared with less than 3% in 1984. Whereas domestic sales have been stable, export sales and the average dollar-per-litre of sales have been rising steadily in the past decade.
The 2003 Wine Industry Directory lists 815 wine producers that export wine - about half of all producers. Two companies, Southcorp and BRL Hardy account for about half of all exports by volume, while the top 22 producers account for 91%1 (see table). The remaining 793 exporters compete for 9%1 of the exports by volume. The largest wine exporters by value are listed (see table).
1Data revised since publishing in the 2003 Australian & New Zealand Wine Industry Directory
|
