Files
Abstract
This paper addresses three questions: how well does Australia's wine industry
performance since the late 1980s compare with previously and with the recent performance of
its competitors abroad; what are the prospects ahead for Australian producers, given that
global wine consumption per capita has not been growing yet premium wine production is
expanding in many countries; and what can be done to improve those prospects? In absolute
terms, and relative to other Australian industries, the wine industry has done extremely well
since the late 1980s in terms of export-led growth. It is now the world's second largest
exporter of wine after the European Union. Relative to other New World wine export
suppliers, however, Australia's trade performance is not outstanding. Exports from the United
States and several other Southern Hemisphere producers also have grown rapidly in quantity
and in quality, albeit from smaller bases. Given that competition from other New World
suppliers, and the quality upgrading of several large wine regions in Europe, the continued
prosperity of the Australian industry depends on it meeting numerous challenges. The way it
is positioning itself to do that may well provide an example to other industries of how to
sustain export-led growth.