The outbound shipments of the Korean rice wine came to US$12.87 million in 2016, down 75.6 percent from 2011, when the tally reached its peak with $52.74 million, according to the data from the Korea Agro-Fisheries & Food Trade Corp.(Image:Yonhap)
SEOUL, Dec. 18 (Korea Bizwire) – South Korea’s exports of the traditional alcoholic beverage “makgeolli” tumbled more than 75 percent last year from five years ago as it failed to build a strong consumer base abroad, data showed Monday.
The outbound shipments of the Korean rice wine came to US$12.87 million in 2016, down 75.6 percent from 2011, when the tally reached its peak with $52.74 million, according to the data from the Korea Agro-Fisheries & Food Trade Corp.
This year’s figure is expected to further plummet as exports of the alcoholic beverage in the January-November period came to $11.1 million, down 4.6 percent on-year, the data showed.
The poor performance of Korean traditional alcohol is in stark contrast with Japan’s sake, whose exports came to $143.61 million last year, up 30.2 percent on-year, according to the data. Exports of China’s iconic alcohol “baijiu” also jumped 172.7 percent to $467.89 million during the same period.
Such a downturn in South Korea’s liquor shipments is partially attributable to the failure of its low price strategy, experts say.
The average price of exported makgeolli was $0.99 per liter last year, while the comparable figures for sake and baijiu came to $7.28 and $28.65, respectively, it said.
(Yonhap)
