The Role of Culture, Language and Trade Agreements in Global Wine Trade

In the progressively globalising world, wine trade is changing shape. In recent decades, major wine producers have suffered a remarkable drop in their domestic wine consumption, while New World wine producers have increased their production potential and induced new demand in foreign markets. These changes have been accompanied by a geographical relocation of wine consumption and trade. The aim of our paper is to analyse the effect of cultural-geographical proximity, free trade and the role of linguistic similarity on bilateral wine trade in the world major wine producer countries, employing balanced panel gravity model. Regression results suggest that larger countries export more wine, while transport costs increase in line with geographical distance, especially for landlocked trading partners. Moreover, global wine export costs are lower if trading partners are culturally similar; have the same religion or both are members of the WTO or have regional trade agreements.