A surge in U.S. exports is emerging as a bright spot in the often-troubled trade ties between the world’s largest economy and its largest foreign creditor.
The boom in U.S. exports is not helping erase America’s trade deficit with China, which was $295 billion in 2011, $22 billion higher than the year before.
The surge is happening without much change in Chinese government policies and without much specific help from the Obama administration, which has a stated goal of doubling all U.S. exports globally by 2014. Instead, experts say, the main reason for the increase has been a booming China, where wealthier tastes include an increased appetite for meat — and hence for soybean used as livestock feed.
Also U.S. wine exports to China grew by 42 percent last year, and similar increases were noted in other Asian nations, according to figures released Thursday by the Wine Institute in San Francisco. It nearly doubled 2010 export numbers as more winemakers are seeking to crack a relatively untapped market.
Wine exports crushed international sales records in 2011, due in large part to growing demand for California wines in China and Hong Kong.
U.S. wine exports to China grew by 42 percent last year, and similar increases were noted in other Asian nations, according to figures released Thursday by the Wine Institute in San Francisco. It nearly doubled 2010 export numbers as more winemakers are seeking to crack a relatively untapped market.
The Chinese economy has doubled in the past seven years, and low-end estimates say there are 1.5 million millionaires. With a population of 1 billion people in China, Gallagher figures only 18 million of them can afford fine wines.
"That sub-segment grows every year," Gallagher said. "The long-term opportunity is to get the rest of those billion people. We have our work cut out for us."
Grape wines still account for just 10 percent of the alcohol consumed in China. Part of the trick in marketing high-end wines in China is in educating palates, and helping Chinese growers produce better quality wines so consumers are not turned off by them, Gallagher said.
Chinese makers of plum and rice wines control 90 percent of the country's market, and consumers are used to improving the taste by mixing it with 7-Up or orange juice.
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