The Wine Advocate to launch Chinese site

The Wine Advocate is to launch a new Chinese-language version of its website this summer and has hired a new Asian reviewer.

The news was announced as part of a complete overhaul of The Wine Advocate’s website at a press conference in New York last week.

The site is currently in a beta version which will go live on 1 April and the new simplified Chinese section is set to launch in June.

It was announced at the press conference that Liwen Hao (pictured) had been hired two months ago to cover Chinese and other Asian beverages including sake and wine.

Hao will be based in Shanghai and his first articles for The Wine Advocate and robertparker.com will appear in the second quarter of the year with the launch of the Chinese site.

In a statement he said: “It is a great honour and a privilege to join Robert Parker and his illustrious reviewer team.

“I feel that China and other areas are coming of age in terms of grape growing and winemaking. It is my hope to bring many high quality, truly interesting Asian wines to the attention of the wine world.”