A blind wine tasting competition is held in Shanghai on May 30. [Photo/WeChat account: scofcom]

The Wine Exchange Shanghai (WINEX) organized a blind wine tasting competition, as part of the Shanghai Imported Goods Festival, on May 30.

The competition selected 12 wines from Italy, France, Australia and other famous wine producing areas, and participants had to guess the identity of the wines only by smelling and tasting.

Besides the entertaining competition, WINEX carried out various online and offline promotions. More than 100 wines promoted by WINEX, which came from dozens of countries, were offered at discounts as high as 30 percent.

Zhang Guohua, chief economic manager of Shanghai Commission of Commerce, made a speech at the event.

According to Zhang, the Shanghai Imported Goods Festival, themed at "Embracing the CIIE (China International Import Expo) and shopping around the world", is a consumption event featuring imported goods and an important part of the Shanghai May 5 Shopping Festival.

Since the launch on May 5, more than 500 offline stores and more than 40 online platforms, led by nearly 20 leading enterprises, have launched 55 activities involving imported commodities from CIIE. By May 30, the sales volume of the imported goods festival had exceeded 500 million yuan ($70.2 million).

In June, WINEX's cross-border e-commerce platform will launch promotions such as French and Italian wine weeks, to further boost consumption during Shanghai's shopping festival.