The Australian Wine Industry at the Crossroads: A Comparison of Performance Across Major Wine Exporting Countries in 2000

ABSTRACT: International market dynamics are often cited as the cause of the decline in the Australian wine industry's relative position globally and the subsequent declining economic returns to the country's diverse regions. However, this perspective has been derived principally from international trade data. By way of providing a more nuanced explanation, we compare Australia's wine production and export performance with that of the 10 largest wine-exporting countries from the Southern Hemisphere New World, North American New World and Old World (European) wine-producing regions for the pivotal year 2000. The analysis deploys three performance measures and one measure for productivity developed specifically for this study. The results suggest that these wine exporters occupied a series of complex positions with respect to one another. Further, Australia's situation was at the time far from dire. Nevertheless, the comparative position from the perspective of performance in 2000 initiated a situation where 'the hunter became the hunted'.