Wine production

The table below - which comes from an entry by Elliott R. Morss at the Wine and Food Economics blog - provides the total wine production by country for 2008. Note just how little wine New Zealand does produce, but as Morss notes in his article, "New Zealand does well in export markets for how much it produces."

	Wine Production
	2008	2004-08	2008
Country	(milhectltrs.)	% Change	per hectare
Italy	46,900	-6%	56
France	42,950	-25%	50
Spain	34,850	-19%	30
USA	20,550	2%	50
Argentina	14,680	-5%	65
China	13,005	17%	26
Australia	11,700	-20%	68
Germany	10,400	4%	102
South Africa	9,890	7%	75
Chile	7,860	25%	40
Romania	6,300	2%	31
Portugal	5,400	-28%	22
Greece	3,750	-12%	32
Brazil	3,500	-11%	35
Hungary	3,400	-22%	47
Austria	2,400	-12%	47
Bulgaria	1,800	-8%	19
New Zealand	1,700	43%	49

Italy, France and Spain are the big boys on the block. The size of Chinese production surprised me but Morss points out its mainly for local consumption. The growth in New Zealand's production over the 2004-8 period is pretty amazing and may help explain the current wine glut.