In western Europe, Heineken sold 47.2 million hl of beverages, down 5.0 percent organically. In central and eastern Europe, the decline was even steeper: - 11 percent to 46.1 million hl. However, Africa and the Middle East saw volumes go up 9.2 percent to 19.8 million hl, as did Asia Pacific: +1.4 percent to 2.7 million hl. Output in the Americas dropped too: -8.9 percent to 9.4 million hl.

Nevertheless, KP managed to increase its market share of the Polish beer market and reached 45.3 percent, up from 42.2 percent in 2008, thus expanding its advantage over its closest competitor Heineken by more than 10 percent.

In 2009 alcoholic drinks volumes dropped by more than 2 percent, a figure that is forecast to slow down to a 1 percent loss in 2010.

Eastern Europe is Carlsberg’s major market, already contributing 44 percent of total volume (including 51.3 million hl beer) and 52 percent of EBIT. For comparison, northern and western Europe contributed 43 percent of total volume (of which 50.2 million hl were beer), and 41 percent of EBIT.

As concerns beer sales, Bavarian brewers appear to have a greater reason for joy than their colleagues further up north. However, figures can be deceptive. Take Bavarian beer exports: they were 3.35 million hl in 2009 or 15 percent of sales, down 100,000 hl year-on-year. For comparison, German beer exports in 2009 were 13.9 percent.

The ship’s christening took place in Hamburg on 9 February 2010. It is owned by AIDACruises, Rostock, a shipping company which already has six other cruise ships sailing the seven seas.

This transaction brings Pernod Ricard closer to completing its EUR 1.0 billion disposal plan (approximately EUR 0.8 billion achieved to date).

If we did not have our archives at BRAUWELT International, we could run into trouble remembering which executives have run AB-InBev’s business unit Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Italy over the past few years. Because who can recall the name of Mr Hösel’s predecessor without resorting to Google? His name was Eric Lauwers (currently President of AB-InBev BeNeLux) who succeeded Oliver Tobias (now with Paulaner) in 2007.

In its report “Global Economic Prospects 2010”, which the World Bank released on 21 January 2010, the authors warn that while the worst of the financial crisis may be over, the global recovery is fragile.

After a decline in turnover during the first nine months of 2009, Krones managed to stem the tide of red ink during the fourth quarter when demand from China and Latin America began to pick up again.