Firm Creation, Firm Evolution and Clusters in Chile’s Dynamic Wine Sector: Evidence from the Colchagua and Casablanca Regions

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increasing their degree of centrality over time. This guarantee’s the quality of knowledge
diffused. However it may render cluster development reliable on a small number of firms.

Conclusion

It seems strange that innovation has become so closely linked to one particular Chilean
sector without it either becoming obvious or apparent. Since the 1990s, however, export
growth has been growing very rapidly indeed. If one compares the US$17.9bn of quality
wine exports in 1988 with the quality wine exports of US$1,012mn in 2007, then one has
a factor of over 56 times over 19 years to contend with. This is the biggest change in
Chile’s wine exports that has yet been experienced. Wine has thus become the fastest
growing sector in terms of exports in the democratic period. In 1989 only 7 per cent of
Chilean wine was exported but by 2007 the percentage had risen to around 70 per cent in
terms of litres produced.

In terms of firm creation it has been the largest companies organised in the last two
decades of the twentieth century that have been most significant. They have developed a
useful plug into the downstream component of these chains. In particular companies have
developed strategies of Gereffi’s organizational success by targeting these main wine
sectors first on the basis that each bottle of wine would receive only a small amount in
terms of extra cash. Now after nearly four years of the peso increasing its value against
the dollar, it is unlikely that this new type of wine product could be replaced again.
Furthermore, there have been companies like Casa Lapostolle and Montes that have used
this window of opportunity as a way of introducing high quality wine (with little export
of bulk or varietal wine) into the international arena.

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