Campaign Calls On People To Buy Australian Wine To Counter Chinese Tarifs

A new campaign is calling on people around the world to buy Australian wine.

China last week unveiled new tariffs of up to 212 percent on Aussie vino, which trade minister Simon Birmingham said would make the industry 'unviable'.

It's unclear how long the new fees will last, however a plan is already underway to counter the tarifs.

The Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China has launched a video featuring politicians from all over the world asking their citizens to pick Australian the next time they're going to the bottle shop.

The Alliance consists of more than 200 MPs from 19 countries who have come to help Australia during its time of need.

Some of the people featured in the video from the IPAC video include US Republican Congressman Ted Yoho, German Green Party MEP Reinhard Bütikofer, Japanese Democrat Rep. Shiori Yamao and former leader of the UK Conservative Party Sir Iain Duncan Smith MP.

Australian Labour Senator Kimberley Kitching said: "China has cancelled a whole range of Australian imports in an attempt to bully us into abandoning our values."

"This isn't just an attack on Australia, it is an attack on free countries everywhere."

The 107-212 percent tariff was introduced after China set up an investigation into allegations that 'wine-dumping' was hurting Chinese wine makers. China accused Australian producers of selling wine below the cost of production to undercut Chinese producers.

That's on top of China's Commerce Ministry giving instructions to suspend six other types of Australian exports.

The tariff has sparked concern with Australian wine makers who depend on exporting to China to make up a big chunk of their profits.

Mitchell Taylor, the managing director of Taylor's Wines, told the ABC: "As an industry we knew something was coming, but to have it come so quickly and so harshly it was really a big surprise and quite an outrageous decision.

"Our wines which normally sell for $25 a bottle will immediately go up by threefold. Meanwhile our competitors - winemakers in France, Chile, and New Zealand - don't have to pay this tax.

"A tariff of this scale will basically kill the industry overnight."

Featured Image Credit: IPAC/Twitter

Topics: News, Australia, Politics

Stewart Perrie

Stewart Perrie is a Trending Journalist at LADbible. His first job was as a newsreader and journalist at the award winning Sydney radio station, Macquarie Radio. He was solely responsible for the content broadcast on multiple stations across Australia when the MH17, Germanwings and AirAsia disasters unfolded. Stewart has covered the conflict in Syria for LADbible, interviewing a doctor on the front line, and has contributed to the hugely successful UOKM8 campaign.

@stewartperrie