That question occurred to me after I received an enthusiastic email from "Australia's Bulk Wine Specialists" Austwine. They advised that "Wine Australia reported the strongest growth in Australian Wine Exports for 8 years. Not since 2007 has annual value growth been +8%. Total exports for the year were A$1.96Bn, including volume growth of +5% to 734mL".
A$1.96Bn converts to about NZ$2.1Bn. I'd recently read somewhere that NZ's total export value for the year to September was NZ$1.47Bn. In 2012 Australia's wine production was roughly six times larger than the Kiwi wine output. They make six times more wine than NZ and yet the value of their wine exports are just 40% greater than NZ's wine exports.
Score one try to NZ.
For the year to September 2015 Australia's wine exports (in litres) grew by 8% while the value of those exports grew by 5%.
In that same period NZ's wine exports (in litres) grew by 9.4% while value went up by 7.6%.
Score another try to NZ.
Australia exports more bulk wine (56%) than bottled wine while NZ bulk wine accounts for around half that share (28.8%). That is one of the factors contributing toward Australia's relatively low average price per litre of NZ$2.87 (A$2.67) for wines exported in the past year when compared with the NZ average of $7.06 per litre.
Score yet another try to NZ.
For the record Australia's top five export markets, in order, are:
◦ UK
◦ US
◦ Canada
◦ China
◦ Germany
◦ (NZ is in 6th place)
NZ's top five export markets (in volume) are:
◦ UK
◦ US
◦ Australia
◦ Canada
◦ Netherlands
In the year to September 2015 Australia exported 26.1 million litres to NZ with an average price of NZ$3.05 (A$2.84). In that same period NZ exported 55 million litres to Australia with an average price of $6.51.
I think that just about adds up to a fairly convincing NZ win. Still, as the Wallabies coach said, "It could be very different in four years' time". True, but it could also be more of the same.
