Australia wants businesses to diversify after China wine tariffs

Australia’s government has warned businesses against relying solely on China for their economic success after Beijing decided to scrap heavy tariffs on Australian wine exports this week. 

Assistant Minister for Trade Tim Ayres said trade diversification was “absolutely critical” for Australian businesses and the government would be working with wine producers to “diversify their trade markets.”

“It’s never good to put all of your eggs in one basket in business terms,” he told reporters at a press conference in Canberra on Friday.

China’s tariffs on Australian wine, some of them as high as 218%, would be lifted over the course of Friday, Ayres said, allowing the return of a trade which at its height was worth A$1.2 billion ($782 million). The trade sanctions were one of a number of measures imposed on Australian exports at the height of tensions between Canberra and Beijing in 2020, following a call by then-Prime Minister Scott Morrison for an independent investigation into the origins of Covid-19.

The Chinese Ministry of Commerce announced on Thursday that it would lift punitive tariffs on Australian exports, saying they were no longer necessary “in view of the changes in the relevant wine market conditions.”

Following the election of the center-left Labor government in May 2022, relations between the two countries have improved. Meetings by high-level officials have restarted and Beijing has lifted trade sanctions on barley, wine, coal and timber. China is Australia’s largest trading partner by a significant margin.

Despite the improving ties, Australian governments of both political persuasions have been pushing businesses to diversify their trading partners in the wake of the China trade sanctions.