Is China losing its love affair with wine?

Is China losing its love affair with wine? China has historically been one of the largest producers of wine in the world, ranked 5th in 2015 when production was 1.7 billion bottles of wine. Production has dropped every year since 2015 and had halved by 2021.

China still has the second largest area under vine, behind Spain but significantly more than France, according to Organization of Vine and Wine (OIV), but plantings have been fairly static compared to levels in 2015.

The declining production of Chinese wine is often attributed to factors such as the tricky growing conditions, domestic taxes, the dominance of a few large producers and lack of incentives for newcomers. Wine also faces strong competition from the traditional Chinese drink Baijiu.
The OIV estimates wine consumption in the China was down 16% in 2022, from 10.5 million hectolitres to 8.8 mhl. 5 years ago, in 2017, wine consumption was over double that figure at an estimated 17.6 mhl.