US beer production estimated to have declined 5 percent in 2022

USA | It was a tough year for US brewers: domestic beer production is believed to have dropped by 5 percent in 2022, a loss of 5.9 million barrels (7 million hl) over 2021. This was reported by the website beerinsights.com on 6 January.

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Europe’s beer sector ready to return, stronger and better, in 2023

Perspectives | Europe’s beer sector is optimistic about returning to its pre-pandemic heights in 2023, The Brewers of Europe Secretary General Pierre-Olivier Bergeron said today at the ninth edition of Beer Serves Europe in Brussels on December, 8.

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Ukraine’s beer production continues to suffer because of the war

Ukraine | Compared with Ukraine’s GDP, which will crash by an estimated 35 percent this year, domestic beer production has fared slightly better. According to Ukrpivo, an industry body, beer output in the January-to-September period was only down 30 percent – to 9.3 million hl – year-on-year. Ukrainian beer exports decreased by 5.6 percent, while beer imports increased by nearly 7 percent and exceeded USD 72 million by value.

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Beer production in Ukraine drops by a third in January-July period

Ukraine | Domestic beer production (until end of July 2022) declined by 32 percent over the same period last year to 7.1 million hl, according to industry body “Ukrpivo”. Beer production recovered during the second quarter, after a massive drop of 50 percent in the first quarter.

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Mexican breweries face crisis in drought-stricken north

Mexico | President Andrés Manuel López Obrador wants beer production in northern Mexico to stop due to drought. The city of Monterrey, a big industrial hub, and located some 240 km south of the Texan border, is rationing water. But Mexico is also the world’s largest exporter of beer, shipping over USD 5 billion of beer in 2021.

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Adieu global brands: Beer production in Russia to drop 4 percent in 2022

Russia | Beer production in Russia is estimated to decline between 4 and 5 percent in 2022, due to rising production costs and decreasing consumer purchasing power, Oraz Durdyev, President of AB InBev Efes’s Russian unit, told Russian media on 7 July 2022.

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The long read: Ukrainian brewers in times of war

Ukraine | Russia’s invasion has wrought havoc on Ukraine, a country of 44 million people. By late April 2022, some estimated 5 million people had fled the country, while more than 7 million people had been displaced internally. Since Russia ended its siege on Kyiv at the end of March and shifted its troops to the east, more than a million Ukrainians are said to have returned to resume their lives, their businesses – and, not least, protect their properties from looting.

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Mexico’s President opposes beer and milk production in arid areas

Mexico | A populist to the core, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador slammed the production of beer and milk in areas where there is not enough water. In 2020, the populist president already cancelled plans for Constellation’s new 10 million hl brewery on Mexico’s northern border, and on 29 March 2021 he questioned the whole idea of producing beer for export.

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Jan Biering takes over operational management from Roland Pahl

VLB Berlin | Jan Biering took over the operational management of the VLB Research Institute for Beer and Beverage Production (FIBGP). He succeeds Dr. Roland Pahl, who left the VLB at the end of January at his own request. Dr. Pahl will join Pall Corporation, a global specialist in filtration, separation and processing.

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New non-GMO breeding platform technology for creating novel lager yeast

Yeast breeding | Renaissance BioScience Corp., a leading global bioengineering company based in Vancouver, Canada, is pleased to officially announce the publication of a landmark paper on lager yeast development in the February 2021 issue of Applied and Environmental Microbiology (Volume 87, Issue 3).

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Brewers in Italy set new records – in 2019

Italy | Before covid-19 hit, Italy’s brewers were on a roll. 2019 saw beer production increase to 17.5 million hl (+5 percent) over 2018, causing domestic consumption to rise to over 20 million hl (+2.6 percent) and exports go up by 13 percent to over 3.5 million hl, according to AssoBirra, a trade body.

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Brewery closures (all but one) leave Mexico with a hangover

Mexico | From April to May this year, beer production in Mexico declined by about 60 percent over the same period last year. Brewers large and small suffered under the shutdown, which began on 5 April 2020, when the government decreed brewing as non-essential, and lasted until early June.

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Covid-19 pandemic sends German beer sales tumbling

Germany | In the first half of 2020, beer sales fell 6.6 percent (or 3 million hl) to around 43 million hl compared with the same period 2019, the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) reported on 30 July 2020.

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Cyber-attack on Lion halts beer production

Australia | A sophisticated foreign state-based hacker is believed to be behind the current attacks on Australian governments and businesses. Among them was the country’s number two brewer Lion.

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Boom in Swiss brewery openings continues

Switzerland | The number of brewery openings rose 11 percent in 2019, to reach 1,132 breweries, after only 32 breweries in 1990 and 81 in 2000. However, most of them – 811 – are really nano-breweries with an annual output of under 20 hl beer.

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Corona virus raises Boston Beer’s costs

USA | With consumer demand for beer shifting to off-premise retailers, Boston Beer’s breweries had to change production from kegs to cans and bottles. Because most of its packaged beers are produced by third-party contract brewers, this led to increased costs.

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Brewing Techniques in Practice

As for late, "Brewing Techniques in Practice" by W. Back, M. Gastl, M. Krottenthaler, L. Narziss, M. Zarnkow has been published. The volume is the completely revised and updated English translation of the handbook “Ausgewählte Kapitel der Brautechnologie”.

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Building a sustainable model for import beers in the United States

USA | Shipping beer and glass over long distances scores poorly on sustainability. Rabobank analyst Francois Sonneville favours a hybrid model, inspired by the wine industry, whereby beer is produced in the country of origin, shipped in bulk, and bottled in the market.

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Brooklyn Brewery goes Asia

After Stockholm and Trondheim, Brooklyn Brewery will tap into South Korea’s booming craft beer market by building a brewery in Jeju, a tropical island off the country’s southern coast, which serves as a popular tourist destination.

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European brewing sector returns to growth with new breweries created

With over 900 new breweries opening since 2013, the European beer industry has bounced back from the financial crisis. This is one of the key findings of a study released on 23 February 2016 by the Brewers of Europe, a lobby group.