2025 EBC Symposium to take place in Hungary

Hungary | The EBC Symposium will take place from 18 to 20 May 2025 at the Department of Bioengineering and Fermentation Technology, Institute of Food Science and Technology, on the campus of the Hungarian University of Agriculture and Life Sciences (Buda Campus), in Budapest, Hungary.

Whereas EBC congresses, taking place every two years, present themselves as a veritable “catwalk” of all aspects of the brewing, malting and fermentation sciences, technology and engineering, the EBC Symposium always has a narrowly defined topic, and presentations have to conform thematically. Other aspects which define the EBC Symposium include the absence of posters and the fact that there is no accompanying tradeshow. There are no parallel sessions, so all presentations are taking place in one plenary setting.

The topic of this year’s EBC Symposium has been chosen as follows: Sustainable packaging for beer – Innovations in keg & tank-beer installations, beer dispense technology and quality. There are many reasons for selecting this topic; the main reasons pertain to the fact that keg technology – as a subject of an EBC Symposium – took place more than 30 years ago and there have been plenty of technical developments in this field. Secondly, and no less important, the European Commission promulgated and has recently passed the PPWR – the Packaging & Packaging Waste Regulation. The expectation is that PPWR implementation will have considerable ramifications to the brewing and beverage industries. With lifespans of stainless-steel kegs or tank-beer installations often in excess of a decade and more, this form of conveying beverages from producer to consumer are very much under the sustainability spotlight.

We issued a “call for abstracts” which, by the time of going to press, is now deactivated and an attractive technical programme has been designed on the basis of submissions received. The usual number of delegates attending the symposium is expected to be around 100–125 participants. An attractive social programme has been drawn-up by our agency, CEBC Expo, in consultation with EBC, the Hungarian Association of Brewers and the university department. Besides the customary “Welcome Evening” on Sunday, 18 May, there will be a fully inclusive boat trip offered on the Danube, enjoying a selection of Hungarian beers and food onboard.

To help with the financial aspect of the symposium, the following companies have been enlisted as sponsors: MicroMatic (Luxembourg), Schäfer (Germany), FIB Beer Systems (Netherlands) and Dolium Kegs (Belgium). A fifth sponsor has not yet been confirmed at the time of going to press.

Up-to-date information can be obtained via the symposium website ebc-symposium.org.

Members and guests of the 14th Technical Meeting of the EBC Brewing Science Group, following on immediately from the symposium (same venue in Budapest), may also be able to glean valuable information from this link.