China ranks as Australia's No.1 wine importer

China is Australia's biggest wine market today as it overthrows the United States. According to Wine Australia, the demand increases more than 50 percent to $474 million for the past 12 months. The US market ranks second with $448 million, while UK ranks third with $361 million.

Wine Australia measures Hongkong's sales growth separately to its mainland. It increases seven percent to $126 million.

Andreas Clark, Wine Australia chief executive, said that one of the reasons in the increase in the wine consumption in the Asian country is the growing number of middle class. The sustained marketing campaign also plays a big role in the promotion of premium, green and clean products that wine makers offer.

“We’ve seen awareness of Australian premium wine improve along with dramatic increases in wine consumption, nascent consumer awareness and interest in wine and wine culture,” Clark told Sky News. "We have worked hard to cultivate our presence and our image. It's things like being in the market, exporters establishing relationships with the distributors, setting up opportunities for exporters and educating the Chinese trade around wine and what Australian wine is."

Australia has been exporting premium wines that cost $10 per litre which is one-third of the total wines that reaches China.

Wine fans in Beijing, Guangzhou and Shanghai are the major consumers as they have higher consumer purchasing power than the fans in other regions. Chinese tourists also contribute in the boost of wine's purchase and consumption. Tourists who visited the famous wine regions purchase and consume more when they return to their country.

“Most of our buyers are now young people born in the 1980s or 1990s. They buy a couple of bottles regularly,” Jin Yang, chief product officer of online streaming company LeTV’s beverage arm Wangjiu.com, told South China Morning Post. He said that the new flavours help in meeting the quality of the old-world French brands.

Last year, there are 1 million Chinese tourists who visited Australia according to the Australia’s tourism authority.