There are increasingly positive signs China will lift tariffs of up to 200% on Australian wine at the end of March, following discussions between Australian Trade Minister Don Farrell and his Chinese counterpart Wang Wentao.
The pair held a meeting at a World Trade Organisation conference in Abu Dhabi on Monday night, where they discussed issues including the tariffs.
The China Commerce Ministry officially commenced its Australian wine tariff review late last year, with wine companies such as TWE suggesting they expected a ruling by the end of March.
TWE has even weighted of Penfolds Bin and Icon shipments in F24 to 2H24 in order to retain the flexibility of Penfolds global distribution and pricing models should there be a positive outcome in relation to the review of tariffs on Australian wine.
Minister Farrell told ABC News: “I’m confident that the discussions I had yesterday with the commerce minister will result in them carrying through on what they undertook, which was to expedite the review of the tariffs and that we will get a result on that in a few weeks’ time.”
He was also enthusiastic about trade growth between the two countries. He told the Australian Financial Review: “We’re talking about more meetings, more discussions, more trade. Just because we’re doing $300 billion worth of two-way trade at the moment doesn’t mean that figure can’t be $400 billion.”
Assistant Trade Minister Tim Ayres told Sky News he expects China to remove their trade impediments on Australian wine producers once their review into wine concludes “shortly”.
We are absolutely focused on a government on normalising the relationship and, in particular, removing the last remaining trade impediments for Australian exports in China,” he said.
“There is an agreed approach that China is following where they are conducting a review very similar to the barley review. We expect that to conclude shortly and expect that China will follow through in the same way they did on barley.”
Foreign minister’s visit tipped to coincide with announcement
There are also rumours that Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi has pencilled in a two-day visit to Australia in the second half of March, o coincide with an end to the crippling tariffs on Australian wine.
This has heightened speculation the results of the review will be positive.
However, the news is little comfort to struggling winemakers such as the Riverland’s Salena Estate, which have been driven to the wall by the sanctions.
Administrators Tim Mableson and Ryan Eagle from KPMG were appointed last week to take control of the company.
Australia wine exports slide as consumers cut back