According to the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) bureaucracy in the form of multiple export certificates and unnecessary testing is costing the Asia Pacific wine industry $1 billion per year. Asian wine markets are major global growth markets with the value of wine traded in the APEC region tripling to $23 billion in 2012 from $7 billion in 2000, and China is expected to become the largest wine-consuming nation within the next 20 years. Currently, different nations require different certificates from wine exporters ensuring that the product is fit for human consumption causing high costs, delays, and confusion. The APEC Wine Regulatory Forum has been working with nations to remove redundant export certification, develop a universal wine certificate model, and electronic submission of documents. So far, the U.S. and China have agreed upon a “consolidated wine export certificate” and Chile has begun a pilot program of electronic certificate submission. According to the World Bank streamlining the process could cut document processing times from nine days to three and would cut costs from $156 per certificate to $52 per certificate.
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