Bulgaria's wine exports to China have fallen by about 84% in five years. Sales dropped from close to 170,000 litres in 2021 to around 27,000 litres in 2025, according to Nikolay Paunov, executive director of the Executive Agency for Vine and Wine.
The drop in money terms is even steeper. Sales brought in around 585,000 euros in 2021, but now earn just about 35,000 euros — a fall of nearly 94%.
Paunov gave the figures at a seminar at the Bulgarian Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Sofia, titled "The Chinese Wine Market — Guidance for Exporters". People joined both in person and online. The EU SME Centre and the China-CEEC Agricultural Cooperation Promotion Centre helped organise the event.
Wine production in Bulgaria has also fallen, from around 0.8 million hectolitres in 2021 to about 0.6 million hectolitres in 2024 and 2025.
Paunov said volume alone won't secure a place for Bulgarian wineries in China. He believes Bulgarian wine's real strengths lie elsewhere: where the grapes come from, local grape varieties and steady quality. The agency backs this up by registering vineyards, checking production, certifying wine and tracking it from grape to bottle — steps that build trust with importers.
Paunov said Chinese buyers are choosier than before, and the fight for their attention has got tougher. China remains an important market for Bulgaria, he said, but it needs careful, precise work rather than hopes that growth will just happen on its own. He said the right approach means choosing wines carefully, working with reliable local partners, sticking closely to registration and labelling rules, and marketing that puts the origin and character of Bulgarian wine first.
Momchil Stanishev, director of the Agricultural Cooperation Promotion Centre, said the question is no longer how to get into a big market. What matters now, he said, is understanding it, finding the right buyers and sales channels, and building partnerships that last. This is a market of around 1.4 billion people, he noted. That matters especially for small and medium-sized firms, many of which, he said, have good products and years of experience.
Vasil Todorov, deputy chairman of the Bulgarian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, said wine is part of Bulgaria's history and cultural identity — and that of most countries in Central and Eastern Europe — not just an industry. He pointed to China as a market of particular interest, since it has a huge number of consumers, a growing wine culture, and rising demand for quality imported goods.
Getting into that market takes preparation, Todorov said: knowing what local consumers like, how goods get distributed, the rules that apply, and how business works in China.