Output and sales of fruit juice drinks in China have developed rapidly in recent years, according to China Fruit Juice Industry Report, 2006-2007, which is among the recent additions to Research and Markets offerings.
In the first half of 2006, the output of fruit juice drinks reached 6.34 million tons, with a year-on-year increase of 29%. However, the sales volume and sales revenue of fruit juice drinks didn't grow synchronously. Fruit juice drinks market meets great challenges in the growth of sales revenue. Therefore, how to promote the simultaneous growth of sales revenue and volume becomes a knotty problem for fruit juice drinks industry.

The market competition of fruit juice drinks becomes more and more drastic. There are now three different strong rival camps in the market: Taiwan-based enterprises like Uni-President and MasterKong, well-known Mainland enterprises like Huiyuan and Wahaha, and large multinational companies like Coco-Cola and Pepsi-Cola. Currently, many front-line beverage brands like Wahaha, Huiyuan, Nongfu Orchard, Unif Orangeade, Minute Maid Orange Juice, Qoo and LOLO have flooded the Chinese market, making the entry of new beverage brands into the Chinese fruit juice drinks market difficult.

At the same time, along with the increasing transparency of fruit juice drinks pricing mechanisms, the profit picture of manufacturers and dealers have become increasingly marginal. Therefore, seeking a new growth engine of profits has become even more urgent. But, in order to take the leading position in the growing competitive fruit juice drinks market, these enterprises have no choice but to implement a different operational strategy.

Now that China's fruit juice drinks industry faces international competition and product internationalization under WTO system, so fruit juice drinks manufacturers should emphasize product standardization by assuring quality of fruit resources.

China is rich in fruit resources. The output of apples and oranges ranks first and third of the world respectively, and the outputs of pears and peaches are at the front rankings of the world as well. In 2006, the total output of apples in China reached 25 million tons and its general price is stable but with slight decline. In addition, the total output of pears was about 12 million tons with the relatively stable price. Although the output of Chinese fruits is high, some fruits are only suitable for fresh eating and unfavorable to be processed into fruit juice, so processing raw materials are in short supply now.

Contrasted sharply with the output of fruits, the consumption of fruit juice drinks are relatively low though China has a large population. The annual per capita consumption of fruit juice drinks is less than 1kg, one-tenth of the average level in the world, one-fortieth of the average level of developed countries. For example, currently the number is 45 in USA, 46kg in Germany, 16-19kg in Japan and Singapore. The world per capita consumption of fruit juice drinks has already reached 7kg.

Based on the world average consumption, the market capacity of fruit juice drinks in China should be 9.1 million tons compared to the current 1.3 million tons. This indicates China's fruit juice drinks industry still has bright prospects.

Source:佚名