Portuguese wine exports were worth €777.9 million last year, growing by 7.5% in both value and volume terms, and setting a new record after the 1.6% decline registered in 2016, according to Instituto da Vinha e do Vinho.
The biggest contribution to this growth came from the Portuguese-speaking market of Angola, which saw imports rise by 40% to €45.8 million, and Brazil, which was up 53% to €44.2 million.
These markets are now the 7th and 8th largest importers of Portuguese wine, respectively, surpassing Canada (€44.1 million) and Switzerland (€29.2million).
The data confirms that France is still the best foreign customer for Portuguese wine, with sales of €109.2 million last year (-0.5%).
Despite Brexit, the UK is still second and is also growing, with sales of €79.1 million (+7.1%), followed by the US with €78.9 million (+5.6%), Germany with €47 million (+8.1%), The Netherlands with €46.6 million (-6.0%), and Belgium with €46.3 million (+2.2%).
The average price per litre remained unchanged at €2.61, despite the fact that prices dropped in the top five foreign markets. The biggest price drops were in Angola (-11.5% to €1.72) and Germany (-7.9% to €1.79), while Danes pay the highest price for Portuguese wine, at €5.35 per litre (+12%).
Wine Trends
Port wine is again the wine export leader, accounting for 40.1% of the total, although this has dropped by almost three percentage points on 2016.
Portugal has moved ahead of France in terms of sales of Port wine, with domestic sales rising 6.1% to €73.7 million, mainly due to tourism.
Produced in the same region as Port, Douro wines recorded a new sales record of €157.3 million (+10.7%), of which €96.2 million was sold in Portugal.
Additionally, wine imports jumped 21.6% in 2017 to €133.8 million, compared to a drop of 5.8% in 2016.
© 2018 European Supermarket Magazine – your source for the latest retail news. Article by Branislav Pekic. Click subscribe to sign up to ESM: The European Supermarket Magazine
