An Analysis Of Spanish Olive Oil Trade With China:The Role Of Commercial Diplomacy

With its 1.3 billion people and their awareness of food safety and quality,China quadrupled its import of foods in the last three years.It has surpass the United States to become the world's largest trading country in terms of imports of goods.Olive oil is one of the most emblematic and prestigious good of the Spanish Food Industry(F&B).With the largest area of olive oil trees,Spain is the world leading exporter of this product.Its olive oil exports to China amounted US$ 9,103 in 2014.Despite this fact,olive oil accounts for only 3,2%of China's total edible oil consumption.China is an under-taped opportunity for Spanish olive oil producers.This is probably due to the lack of information by Chinese consumers on the product-particularly in the way of consuming olive oil-.Another major reason might be because the Spanish olive oil industry is made up of a large numbers of small producers that and not-well informed about the Chinese market.Commercial diplomacy involves different activities including trade policy-making and business-support activities as well as the communication with foreign authorities and publics.Governments are concerned with maintaining the competitiveness of their economies.Commercial diplomacy has become feature of modern international relations to create a favorable environment for trade and commerce.One of the tools used by commercial diplomats is National Branding It is about the communication of information and ideas to foreign publics with a view to changing their attitudes towards the originating country or reinforcing existing beliefs.Nation-branding strategies aspire to positively influence country image perceptions amongst target audiences.One major aim of public intermediaries is to promote a country's national image and its national industries such as the Spanish olive oil industry.-giving to the Chinese consumers a better understanding of the product and to the small producers a better understanding of the Chinese market.Diplomats use their political resources that individual companies do not have to encourage country's international business.Perceptions of Spain are overall stereotyped,simplified,and not true to the current reality of the country.At the time,international consumers had limited knowledge of Spanish products and brands.As a consequence thereof I present an effective commercial diplomacy strategy as a business promotion activity from the trade institutions such as Spanish Institute for Foreign Trade(ICEX),based on national branding called "made-in Spain"The study reveals that a successful commercial diplomacy campaign based on the Spain Brand Project in China will help to create a more favorable and lasting image among the international audience,enhancing a country's influence and thus further strengthen international business.This paper makes a number of recommendations on how to improve performance given the growing willingness of governments to emphasize the business promotion approach of the Spanish olive oil industry in China.