At the opening ceremony of the Hong Kong International Wine Fair today, John Tsang, Financial Secretary (on right in photo), announced an important step towards streamlining access to the Mainland Chinese wine market:
"I am pleased to tell you that we have just reached agreement with the Mainland Customs to provide customs facilitation measures for wine exported from Hong Kong to the Mainland. We are also discussing with their food safety department, the Administration of Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine, to see if we can introduce even further measures."
At a later session, another government official said they expected to announce more details in "the next 1-2 weeks."
What it means
Currently, mainland China has roughly a 50% duty on imported wine plus inspection/sampling laws which permit bottles to be "tested" (and destroyed in the process). If this announcement signals a potential removal of those barriers for wine flowing through Hong Kong (but not from elsewhere), it will help Hong Kong further its ambition (already well on its way to being realized) to become the wine trading hub for Asia. For wine collectors, even higher demand for fine wine from China (if essentially duties are removed via passing through Hong Kong) translates into continued upward price pressure on fine wine prices globally.
P.S. For the full text of John Tsang's speech, click here.
