More than one in 12 alcoholic drinks sold in supermarkets, outside of promotions, would clash with UK government plans to ban sales of items priced below 40 pence (USD 0.65/EUR 0.50) per unit of alcohol, and cider would be hit the hardest.

The UK parliament’s International Development Committee (IDC) is seeking transparency from oil, gas and mining firms over the amount of tax paid in developing countries. A parliamentary inquiry is likely to press the UK government into signing an international agreement to force these companies to report on how much tax they pay to developing countries.

The first quarter reporting season is upon us. AB-InBev said on 30 April 2012 that it shipped 1.8 percent more beer and other drinks overall in the first quarter of 2012. The world’s biggest brewer reported its net profit jumped 75 percent, thanks to lower financing costs and taxes as well as higher beer sales. Its core profit (EBITDA) rose 7.4 percent to USD 3.55 billion. That was slightly below the average analyst expectation of USD 3.58 billion.

For more than ten years, Austria's biggest brewers refused to supply independent wholesalers with draught beer. An Austrian court, in early March 2012, decided that this was unlawful and moreover reeked of price fixing – despite the brewers' claims that hygiene and beer quality would have been at risk had the brewers not supplied the publicans directly.

Not sure if Red Bull gives wings to people, but lots of people give wings to Red Bull's turnover. Publishing its 2011 results in March 2011, Red Bull said a total of 4.6 billion cans of the energy drink were sold worldwide in 2011, representing an increase of 11.4 percent over 2010. Turnover rose 12.4 percent to EUR 4.3 billion year-on-year.

The puritans on the board of the Advertising Standards Authority lack any sense of irony, or on 10 April 2012 they would not have banned a radio commercial for Budweiser beer, after a complaint that it suggested that men who drink beer on a night on the town would be more likely to "pull" (ie attract the opposite sex) than .. than ... sadly the commercial would not say.

Why does Danish brewer Carlsberg plan to spend up to USD 1.2 billion to buy the 15 percent of Russia's Baltika brewery that it does not already own? Anybody in a rush? And why did it promise to pay so much (the maximum 1,550 rubles/USD 52 per share represent a 25 percent premium on the current stock price), although everyone and his dog know that the Russian beer market spells trouble?

Visiting Vienna will make Munich beer lovers eat out their hearts. How come Munich sports only three brewpubs whereas Austria's capital, which at 1.7 million inhabitants is hardly bigger than Munich, has so many brewpubs? By Conrad Seidl's count "about ten" – depending on who's actively brewing or just using the brewing kit for decor. Conrad is the man to know because the Viennese beer writer and man-about-town publishes an annual beer guide of Austria's best pubs and bars.

Heidi and Peter do it

Think Swiss, think high mountains, chocolate, cheese and watches, spick and span villages with cuckoo clock houses where ZZ Top lookalikes play the Alphorn while the little gnomes of Zürich shunt their gold to and fro in the vaults under Bahnhofstrasse. Don’t we all love these tired and trite clichés about Switzerland, which give us a healthy dose of patronising amusement at the twee-ness of it all? Swiss stereotypes capture much of what Switzerland was and still is – but miss out what it has become: a nation of garagiste brewers. In a country of 7.8 million people there’s over 340 of them already – and rising. When it comes to putting the romance back into the beer, these newly converted show great stubbornness and perseverance. But isn’t that another typecast?

It’s the wrong sort of emerging market and it’s the wrong sort of price. Molson Coors’ multi-billion foray into central Europe with the acquisition of Czech Republic-based StarBev, the brewer of Staropramen beer, which was announced on 3 April 2012, left investors more than underwhelmed. On the day the deal became public, the U.S.-Canadian beer group’s stock dropped 5 percent.