South Africa’s wine industry is anticipating an excellent 2025 grape harvest, which is good news for the industry’s export growth.
Along with South Africa’s gains in grain, soybean and horticulture yields, the grape harvest has recovered significantly from last year’s poor harvest.
SA Wine and Vinpro forecast the wine grape harvest will be 1.244 million tonnes, an 11% recovery from last year’s poor harvest.
“Mild, dry weather created near-perfect ripening conditions, yielding fruit with superb balance, flavour, and structure — the foundation of premium wine production,” SA Wine said.
“With the harvest like this, our preoccupation for the coming months will continue to be the export markets and logistics.”
While the US market has dominated the trade conversation in recent weeks, long before the Trump tariffs, the South African wine industry and the entire agricultural sector have focused on expanding export markets beyond the existing ones.
Agricultural economist Wandile Sihlobo points out that South Africa’s agricultural sector is export-oriented, with exports reaching a record $13.7 billion in 2024, up 3% from the previous year, according to data from Trade Map. “This reflects both an increase in the volume of agricultural exports and higher prices of some products.
“The top exported products by value include citrus, grapes, maize, apples and pears, wine, nuts, fruit juices, sugar, berries, dates, pineapples, avocados, wool, apricots and peaches, ciders and beef.”
The focus on broadening export markets is more urgent than ever in light of the better quality and volumes in wine and other agricultural product output.
“One of the primary areas we focus on is China, which has a large population and buying power. China accounts for 11% of global agricultural imports,” says Sihlobo.
“However, the South African agricultural sector, specifically the wine industry, faces some constraints. For example, we face tariffs of 14% on wine exports in China, while our competitors, such as Australia, face 0% duties as they have a trade agreement with China. We have been vocal about such issues for some time.
“Now, the environment is even more urgent and appropriate to open these new markets, as China also looks to increase its agricultural trade with South Africa.”
Sihlobo believes South African agricultural exports may reach a fresh high in 2025, surpassing last year’s $13.7bn. “This assumes better commodity prices and promising volumes.”
