Wine From The Gobi Desert

Vineyard in the Gobi Desert

Wine From The Gobi Desert Aims At Booming Market -- Reuters

(Reuters) - As spring warms the sands of the Gobi desert in China's vast Inner Mongolia region, it's not just the local camels who are happy to see the end of a long, cold winter.

Just a few hundred metres from towering sand dunes, workers unearth row upon row of grapevines buried under the sand to protect them from temperatures as low as -20 degrees Celsius (-4 Fahrenheit).

These vines are helping fuel a booming Chinese wine industry that has grown by leaps and bounds in recent years, as the world's most populous nation grows wealthier and embraces foreign tastes.

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Editor: More info on wine from the Gobi Desert can be read and watched here.

A High-End Chinese Wine?

Jia Bei Lan 2009

China Drinks In Wine Success -- Jim Boyce, Wall Street Journal

A surprising newcomer is challenging European supremacy in fine wines.

A Chinese wine was launched yesterday in Beijing for 900 yuan ($142) per bottle. Some already consider that price outrageously high, others woefully low. If the price sticks, this could mark the emergence of Chinese wine into the realm of fine, high-price wines, which are predominantly French.

The vintage in question, Jia Bei Lan 2009, last year shocked experts when it became the first Chinese wine to win an "international trophy" in Decanter magazine's World Wine Awards in London, and in a category for wines made with Bordeaux grape varieties, no less. Given the general global disdain toward wine from China, this not surprisingly resulted in suggestions the contest was either fixed by the magazine or the wine was fake—that is, a French wine in a Chinese bottle.

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My Comment: They are already producing a number of excellent non-wine products right now .... my prediction .... give them a few more years and decades .... and I am sure that the wine that they will then be producing will be excellent.

World Recognition Of Chinese Wine Labels Is Not There Yet

Champagne, Bordeaux... Ningxia? -- CNBC

Earlier this month Moët Hennessy became the latest French winemaker to announce a Chinese joint venture, this time to produce sparkling wine in the remote north-western Ningxia, but some wine experts believe the world is not quite ready for Asian wine. Vintner and contributing editor at Decanter magazine Steven Spurrier told CNBC.com that the West’s insatiable appetite for cheap Chinese goods is unlikely to be matched by a foreign market for Chinese produced wine.

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My Comment: My experience with Chinese wine has not been good. Maybe with time they can accomplish something .... but that time is not now.