Croatian Wines Breaking into Lucrative Japanese Market

Croatian wines at Japan trade fair (photo: belje)

Four Croatian wineries – Vina Belje, PP Orahovica, Kraljevski vinogradi and Zlatan Otok – have recently presented their wines at Japan’s largest trade fair…

Around 364 million litres of wine are drunk annually in Japan with imports from Europe dominating the local market. Japan provides a great opportunity for Croatian wines with a market of over 130 million people and the industry that turned up to the Supermarket Trade Show were impressed with what they tasted, rating the Croatian wines highly. One of main distributors, Fuji Trading, have indicated that they will increase their imports of Croatian wines this year.

“Croatian wines in Japan are still not very well-known, and currently small quantities are imported. But, the reaction of buyers is very positive, and that is why we are planning to attend all the important wine trade fairs in Japan and conduct tastings with Croatian wines 3-4 times a year,” poslovni.hr reported Tsuneharu Hiyoshi, director of Fuji Trading, as saying.

“Belje wines export Riesling, the most renowned Croatian wine variety, which with its freshness and authenticity showed to be an excellent selection of wine for Japanese cuisine. On this demanding market it is important to have an excellent price-quality ratio, and our Riesling is selected as such a wine, evidenced by its continuing export demand and availability at selected shopping malls and restaurants in Japan,” said Ljiljana Vajda-Mlinaček, Executive Director of Marketing and Tourism at Belje.

(photo: Belje)

PP Orahovica say that the demand for their wines in Japan has doubled from last year and they expect excellent growth this year. Kraljevski vinogradi presented their Dalmatian varieties pošip, plavac mali and crljenak at the show.

The Croatian Ambassador to Japan Dražen Hrastić supported the presentation of Croatian wines and also introduced the tourist and economic potential of Croatia for Japanese tourists and businessmen. Honorary Consuls Hiroshi Ojima from Osaka and Koichi Takakura from Okinawa also lended their support to the Croatian wines promotion.