28 January, 2010
Embargoed 11.30 am Canberra Time
6/2010
Wine production down: ABS
Last financial year saw another decrease in wine production, according to figures released
today by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS).
The total grape crush for 2008-09 was 1.7 million tonnes, down by 5.4% on the previous
year; the area of grape vines fell by 157,000 hectares and the yield dropped to 10.7 tonnes
per hectare.
The crush produced 1.2 billion litres of wine, down by 5.9% on last years figure. Red/rosé
wine production was 630 million litres (down 6.8%) and white wine accounted for 542
million litres (down 4.5%).
Exports of Australian produced wine rose 5.2% (to 752 million litres) and domestic sales
went up slightly to 430 million litres.
Despite the rise in exports and domestic sales, inventories of beverage wine remained at
1.9 billion litres. Red/rosé table wine stocks of one billion litres still represent more than
half of the beverage wine stock held by winemakers.
The 13 largest winemakers crushed a total of 1.3 million tonnes of grapes, or 73% of the
total crush. These 13 businesses averaged 98,000 tonnes each. Conversely, the 76
smallest winemakers accounted for only 0.4% of all grapes crushed and averaged 96
tonnes each.
A third of all winemaking locations were in South Australia, accounting for 43% of the
national wine grape crush.
Further information is in Australian Wine and Grape Industry (cat. no. 1329.0) available for
FURTHER INFORMATION:
Media requests and interviews
Corporate Communications 1300 175 070
Media note:
When reporting ABS data, the Australian Bureau of Statistics (or ABS) must be attributed as the
source.
NEWS 
