Hong Kong as a Hub and the 2009 Wine & Spirits Fair

I may have mentioned before, I don’t particularly like attending wine trade fairs so was in two minds about attending this year’s Hong Kong Wine & Spirits Fair (HKIWSF).  The cheesy prefabricated stands, the crowds of visitors more interested in communicating with their hand-phones, the jaded producers and the slap-dash masterclasses – for me these fairs seem to sap a lot of the passion out of wine.  But for all their tactlessness they are very handy facilitators of business.  I’d been informed for example that the Thai Winery Association would have a good presence there and I wanted taste their new releases as well as sniff around for other Asian produced wines of quality.  Plus with all the brouhaha that the Hong Kong Trade Development Council (HKTDC) created around Asia about their second annual, government sponsored wine exhibition over 4-6th November 2009, I felt I wouldn’t be doing my job if I didn’t take a look. 

You really have to hand it to the Hong Kong government for their support towards developing HK as the recently crowned Wine Hub King of Asia.  For several years HK has aspired to be Asia’s wine hub yet with their axing of duties on wines and spirits in Feb 2008, the government demonstrated just how serious it is about supporting that positioning.  Since then HK has very successfully set itself up as a headquarters for regional wine companies, schools and all types of middlemen.  However, much of HK’s recent success can be attributed to its proximity to and relationship with mainland China. While there’s a lot of back-patting going on these days in HK about the increase in wine traffic, less frequently discussed is the amount of illegal cross-border duty free liquor trading.  The HKTDC is all too eager to point out that wine imports into HK are up by 122% in the 18 months since the taxes were dropped, but I wonder how much of this is actually being consumed in HK?  And what happens to HK’s crown if Chinese importers get their way and the government suddenly axes the duties there too?  There are rumours that HK is trying to convince China to allow duty free passage to the mainland via HK in order to pre-empt such a situation, but this compromise may not sit well for long with the mainlanders.

As part of all the government’s wine hub-bubbing prior to this year’s Hong Kong Wine & Spirits Fair much was done by the HKTDC to coax overseas buyers and journalists through the doors.  Key importers and wine writers in Singapore were even offered heavily subsidized Business Class Flights, luxury accommodation and tickets to the fair at a total all-inclusive cost to them of only SG$500, just to attend.  (Not I, mind you, though I would have had to decline the offer anyway since my primary interest in attending was to compile an unbiased report on the event.)

The first two days of the three day fair were dedicated to the trade while the third day was reserved for consumers.  I attended on the second day of the event, a designated trade day.  My first observation was that it was reasonably well attended with a better turn-out than many wine fairs in Asia.  Although it was clear that on the “trade day” many of the attendees were not trade.  By my own rough calculations (and from speaking with exhibitors) an estimated 40% of the visitors attending on that second trade day were purely consumers.  This was visibly apparent by the lack of guests using spittoons and treating the stands like open bars.  And I heard a few complaints from exhibitors that there was a general lack of serious buyers.

Kim Wachtveitl of the Thai Winery Association (an exhibitor) offered this comment:

“Overall the fair was well organized by the Hong Kong Trade Commission.  There were only a few glitches during set up, as many people were sent to the wrong party to solve some problems. Otherwise the team were very eager to please.  Business matching arrangements etc was well coordinated, seemed like there were many good seminars.

This fair is geared towards mainland China, which is not our intention.  For us it was a great opportunity to conduct sampling, as most press, trade and few Hong Kong buyers and consumers were surprised of the overall quality of Thai wines.  6 Thai wines won a bronze medal (in the wine competition), with our Monsoon Valley Colombard 2009 being awarded best Thai wine.”

For attendees there were a good number of top-notch producers and wine companies participating in the fair.   France was the fair’s “partner country” this year and had an impressive presence.  New Zealand also had a good turn-out with a number of high calibre wineries there under the umbrella of The New Zealand Winegrowers association.  Particularly well represented were Australian exhibitors with around 65 present this year.  Following their support for this year’s fair, an agreement was recently signed between the HKTDC and the Australian Trade Commission to be the partner country for the fair in 2010.

One of the highlights of the event was the adeptly managed Cathay Pacific Hong Kong International Wine & Spirits Competition that was run in conjunction with the event, organized by Debra Meiburg MW and Simon Tam with Dr Tony Jordan as Guest Chairman.  More than 1300 wines were submitted from around the world.  There were several aims of the competition to set it apart from others around the world.  The most interesting one to me was that a few Chinese dishes were selected to be paired and evaluated with a shortlisted selection of the entries.  The dishes selected included Braised Abalone, Dim Sum, Peking Duck and Kung Pao Chicken.  “Now when people want to entertain with wine they go to Western restaurants.  If we’re ever going to grow the market we need to demonstrate that wines can go with local foods,” commented Meiburg.  The inspiration for this aspect of the competition came from the Sydney International Wine Competition which is run in a similar fashion and was studied by the HK organizers from a logistical perspective.  My only comment here is that if HK is looking to develop itself as a hub for Asia and this is an Asian competition, then perhaps they should have included some other regional dishes rather than focusing solely on Chinese cuisine?

Another unique aspect of the competition was selection of judges using “Asian faces only”.  Apart from the chiefs Meiburg and Jordan, a requirement of all the other judges was that they were Asian born and bred.  The intention behind this is understandable – when it comes to wine events even in Asia, international panels can be dominated sometimes by non-Asians.  But as Asia becomes more multi-cultural, perhaps the criteria should have been Asian residents, chosen on their ability to taste wine and their experience in Asia, regardless of their race?  But apart from this minor quibble the panel was well chosen, representing a broad range of Asian cultural backgrounds and experiences.  Meiburg alluded to some heated discussions at times during the wine and food matching part of the competition, which in my book makes the results that much more interesting and relevant!

With the HKIWSF 2009 done and dusted, the big question on everyone’s lips is that with the former establishment of the biannual Vinexpo Asia-Pacific Exhibition in Hong Kong, does HK need another wine trade fair?  Does the HKIWSF offer something distinctive to Vinexpo (or is it simply cannibalising exhibitors and visitors)?  Is there room in HK for both events?  My gut feeling is a definitive “no” to all three questions.  In the years to come it will be interesting to see which exhibition comes out standing!

I didn’t feel it would do them justice to tack my Thai Wine recent releases tasting notes at the end of this article, so they will feature in their own article next time.  I also wanted to taste some of the new wines coming out of China at the fair, but as I eagerly rocked-up to the Chinese Wine Pavilion the whole exhibit appeared to be closed (at 2 p.m. – the fair didn’t close until 6 p.m.) with a few folks drinking what remained of the Chinese wine samples at a table in the middle.  When I finally managed to get someone’s attention I was told there was no more Chinese wine to taste.  I pointed to an empty bottle of a wine on display which had won a medal in the competition and asked if I could taste a little of that one.  The man nodded, left the stand for a few moments and came back with a glass of red wine, which was a little surprising since the award winning wine was meant to be a Chardonnay.  A swift sniff and a taste confirmed to me that either the Chinese are now making Chardonnay that tastes remarkably like Australian Shiraz or that clearly something has been lost in the translation of the terms: wine fair, samples and authenticity.  Ah well, maybe there’ll be some good Bordeaux-flavoured Chinese wines available at Vinexpo Asia-Pacific in May 2010?