THE EMERGING BRAZILIAN WINE INDUSTRY: CHALLENGES AND PROSPECTS FOR THE SERRA GAÚCHA WINE CLUSTER

The objective of this paper is to analyse the Brazilian wine industry, focusing particularly the Serra Gaúcha wine cluster, located in the state of Rio Grande do Sul, and responsible for over 80 % of the country’s wine production. The concern here is with the industry’s capacity for sustained development in a competitive environment increasingly internationalized and characterized by a growing global excess supply, falling worldwide consumption and aggressive export strategies on the part of established as well as emergent wine-producing countries. In spite of several weaknesses of the industry and of the challenges posed by an unfavourable international environment, this paper provides both qualitative and quantitative evidences that a series of underlying conditions for the sustainable development of the industry are present in the wine cluster of Serra Gaúcha. Both secondary sources and survey-based data were used and the conceptual base that guided the analysis draws basically on the notion of cluster and its role in the creation of sustainable competitive advantages, with special emphasis on cooperative actions that enhance learning and innovation within the cluster