As the Chinese middle class increases its taste for Australian wine, they too are becoming more interested in the regions from where it is made according to Shanghai based Wine Australia representative, Jessie Qian.
"(Chinese) Consumers used to think that all Australian wine was the same, but now they have a sense of the different regions – cool and warm for instance,”Qian told ABC News.
"There's probably one region in each state that's quite well known in China's big cities, Margaret River in WA, the Barossa in SA for example."
Wine Australia is currently hosting a tour through a number of key South Australian wine regions for Chinese wine professionals. Chinese wine writer, O Koo echoed Qian’s comments stating that as the Nation’s middle class increases their wine intake, they are also becoming increasingly curious as to the region in which the vintage is made.
Qian says that communicating a story about people, culture and landscape of the different wine regions is key to its success in the Chinese market.
"It's not about the technical aspects of any vintage – we love to talk about the winemaker and see their environment," he said.
The growing Chinese middle class has been heralded as a key market for premium quality commodities such as wine and dairy. The National Australia Bank last year released a report stating that exports of Australian wine into the Chinese market is set to rise by 50 percent within the next three years, and that Australia needs to focus on producing wines for the premium end of the market in order to successfully capitalise on the boom.