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Winning wine stories

Now that the U.S. has withdrawn from the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the Japan-EU Economic
Partnership Agreement, all of the U.S. competitors will enter Japan duty free by 2019 while the full 15
percent import duty will continue to be charged on California wines, said Ken-ichi Hori, the Wine
Institute’s Japan trade director. “U.S. wine importers in Japan hope the U.S. will establish a Free Trade
Agreement with Japan as soon as possible to abolish the heavy import duty disadvantage of U.S. wines,
which will help the entire American wine category grow in Japan.”

But in the meantime, the Wine Institute is working on numerous promotions to win and expand other
international markets. For example, the popular California Wine Fair in Toronto was attended by more
than 1,000 trade and media members last month.

The event offered a chance to enjoy a selection of more than 400 premium wines from 100 of
California’s top producers, from all the major wine-growing regions of the Golden State. And part of the
proceeds went to Second Harvest food rescue.

“Despite a flat wine market in Canada and ongoing exchange rate challenges, Canada remains the top
dollar value market for California wines. Canadian consumers have confidence in the quality and value
offered by California wineries whose wines are successful in all price segments,” according to Rick
Slomka, Wine Institute trade director for Canada. U.S. wines were the number-one table wine category
by value in Canada in 2017 for the fourth consecutive year with almost $1.1 billion Canadian dollars in
retail sales.

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