The wine market is flooded with support – Kommersant FM
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Shops, cafes and restaurants can set a quota for Russian-made wine – the idea of fixing a certain share was proposed by the Association of Winemakers and Winegrowers of Russia. The State Duma is ready to support this initiative, Deputy Chairman of the Committee on Economic Policy Sergei Altukhov told RIA Novosti. It is expected that starting from the fall of 2024, alcohol sellers should form 20% of their assortment from domestic drinks. In the future, every second bottle will be from Russian vineyards. In addition, market players propose introducing import duties of 200% for wine from NATO countries.
All of these measures, the authors of the initiative believe, should protect the domestic market. But some manufacturers believe that forcing consumers to switch to local brands is unlikely to produce good results. The founder of the Le K2 wine project, Kira Efimova, offers other ways to support the industry:
“If we are talking about the competitiveness of our product, then its cost has increased due to the fact that 90% of the equipment is imported from Europe, and now it is generally “grey” imports. Oak and cork are also supplied from the EU.
If we are talking about protectionist measures, then this is, of course, good. But for the consumer, variability will disappear, and we may face the fact that due to such market protection, the quality of production may drop significantly.
It might be worth making more subsidies for domestic equipment manufacturers. Then its cost, in particular, of bottling and receiving lines, would be reduced by at least 30-50%, which would be very helpful. Now the cost of the middle segment of Russian wine is no less than 600 rubles. per bottle, even if we are talking about enterprises of several thousand hectares. For enterprises with a vineyard area of, say, 10 hectares, the cost price is already above 1 thousand rubles.”
In mid-2023, the government has already increased the import duty on wine from European countries by almost double. But this did not help fill store shelves with domestic products. According to the Association of Winegrowers and Winemakers, over the past year the share of imported drinks increased by 4% compared to 2022 and reached 48%, while the Russian segment decreased from 56% to 52%.
However, some experts assess this situation as temporary. By the fall, Russians will drink up their stocks of imported wine and switch to local wine, believes Alexander Lipilin, executive director of Fortwine: “There is still a fairly large amount of inexpensive imports, but these are leftovers, all of this will be sold by mid-summer, or at most by the fall.
We can already say that in the category of wines costing up to 700 rubles. Russia prevails.
In the more expensive category, the situation is slightly different, but domestic wines are still growing in sales. The import process is quite inert, that is, now we are selling what we ordered four to seven months ago, and contracted, perhaps, even earlier. As these residues are “washed out,” the Russian Federation’s share will begin to increase.
Therefore, I believe that at the moment we just need to wait, and in the next six months or two, we will probably see a significantly larger share of Russian wines than now. If today it is 54%, then I think we will reach 70% without any draconian measures. Further actions seem redundant to me.”
Meanwhile, according to the Federal Customs Service, wine imports to Russia grew by 6% last year. Most of the drinks were brought from Italy, Georgia, Spain, France and Portugal.
Everything is clear with us – Telegram channel “Kommersant FM”.
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