Vintage competition pops cork in China

Concours Mondial de Bruxelles, one of the world's largest annual international wine competitions, was held in Haidian district, Beijing from May 10 to 12.

The prestigious event promotes talented brewers and distillers to potential new customers and helps to build an integrated platform for wine production, supply and sales.

Embodying a spirit of openness, sharing, technology, green, safety and honesty, 400 judges scored more than 9,180 wines from 51 countries during the three-day event.

It is the first time in its 25-year that the international competition has been held outside Europe and hosted in Asia, which has helped cement China's potential in the global wine industry as a fast-emerging market.

CMB President Baudoin Havaux, son of the event's founder Louis Havaux, said that China has developed into one of the most mature countries for the wine industry and become one of the biggest markets of global major wine producers.

Haidian district, as the organizer of this year's CMB, provided an unforgettable competition, Havaux said.

Yu Jun, Party secretary of Haidian district committee, said that the craftsmanship spirit of brewers focusing on the quality of their wines is in perfect harmony with Haidian district's pursuit of innovation.

Haidian district provided high quality services, rich cultural tourism resources and profound technological innovation in support of the CMB to help strengthen the cultural exchanges between China and West, Yu said.

Chinese technology giant Xiaomi Corp provided high-tech products during the competition, such as the electronic judging interfaces, facial recognition check-in system, online translator of 10 languages and robot service assistants.

In addition to the official competition, a warm-up activity – looking for folk wine tasters—was held to select three wine tasters to join the CMB judging group.

The one-month-long activity attracted 3,000 competitors from 34 cities nationwide, including special columnists and record holders from the China International Sommelier Guild.

The top 12 participants were challenged with blindly tasting 30 kinds of wines and answering questions about their history and culture.

Shang Xuanyu, Shuai Zekun and Xue Yong won the first three prizes and became three official judges of the 25th CMB.

Wang Peng, director of Haidian district's business commission said the activity promoted good wine to the greater public as well as its rich history and culture.