Improving efficiency and sustainability | Our world has recently undergone considerable transformation within a short period of time. We are currently experiencing or are contending with the consequences of the Covid pandemic, the war in the Ukraine, the effects of climate change, product shortages, increasing energy and raw material costs as well as labor shortages and disrupted supply chains. It seems that we are being relentlessly confronted with ever-growing challenges – especially within just the past few months. Some issues were able to be anticipated, while others were not. How should the brewing and beverage industry approach these challenges and which positions should it take in the future? We posed these questions to the representatives of various companies in our industry, with an eye to both the current and long-term challenges of our time. Today, we are speaking to Dr. Roland Pahl-Dobrick, Beer Market Manager at Pall Corporation.

Data analysis | Increasing digitalisation makes it possible to collect and analyse copious amounts of data with multivariate cause-and-effect relationships. However, brewery operations face major challenges when attempting implementation on their own. This contribution presents findings and solution pattern from the research project “Data-driven Process Optimisation using Machine Learning in the Beverage Industry” (DaPro).

Digital transformation | The construction of a new production facility poses increasingly greater challenges for the international brewing and beverage industry. To name just a few factors: Its flexibility must be ever greater, it must consume fewer and fewer resources and raw materials and its time to market must be as short as possible. Against this background, Ziemann Holvrieka GmbH is breaking new ground in the realization of a turnkey project. In this case, standardization and digitalization are of central importance.

Prepared for the future | The American craft beer industry emits about half a billion metric tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere annually and is all too aware of the need to conserve energy and become more sustainable and environmentally responsible. Brewing is an energy intensive business that creates waste materials and by-products in equal measure and in today’s environmentally conscious landscape the need for sustainability is more important than ever.

Digital integration | In a market where consumer demands and preferences can instantly change, being agile is no longer a “want” but an absolute “must have”. Heineken, being one of the largest brewers in the world, knows this all too well. To ensure the company can keep pace with ever-changing market conditions and business requirements now and for the future, Heineken’s focus is now on becoming the best-connected brewer through the launch of its EverGreen global business strategy. Seeking technology capable of facilitating this goal has been fundamental for its success.

Insight into Sustainable actions | The BarthHaas Group, comprised of BarthHaas Germany, BarthHaas UK, Hop Products Australia (HPA), and John I. Haas, Inc., has published their first Global Sustainability Report: in it, the world’s leading hop product and service provider documents the environmental, social, and economic challenges affecting hop cultivation and processing in the reporting period August 2017 to July 2021.

Europe | In an ideal world, a marketer knows what her customers want even before they do. Beer marketers think they have got closer to this, thanks to the clever use of data. As they see it, the world contains an unimaginably vast amount of digital information. This makes it possible to do many things that previously could not be done: provide fresh insights, spot business trends, unlock sources of economic value.

Collecting Collectively | Since October 2nd 2020, Dr. Martin Zarnkow of the Research Center Weihenstephan for Brewing and Food Quality has been the new chairman of the Mitteleuropäische Brautechnische Analysenkommission (Central European Commission for Technical Brewing Analysis), or MEBAK for short. He has succeeded Prof. Frank-Jürgen Methner of the TU Berlin, who headed MEBAK from 2016 to 2020. The organization, too, currently finds itself in a period of transition – a very good reason for BRAUWELT International to visit its new chairman.

RESTLESS RETIREMENT | After a rewarding professional life, those who still want to remain active in retirement do, in fact, have alternatives. In Bonn, Germany, there is an organization called “Senior Experten Service” (SES) which finds retirees work assignments in foreign countries lasting several weeks. There, the seniors are able to apply the knowledge and experience they have gained over the years of practicing their professions to aid those who require these services – a win-win situation. Brewer Horst Ernst Bismark has been deployed by SES almost 30 times.

New beginning | His term of office is coming to an end: Tiago M. Brandão hands over to the nominee, Benet Fité Luís, after 5 years as President of the EBC (European Brewery Convention). And this is taking place in eventful times. The coronavirus pandemic has resulted in a decision to recommend that the 38th EBC Congress, planned for late spring/early summer 2021, should be postponed to 2022. The good thing about this move is that in 2022, the EBC will also be celebrating its 75th anniversary. BRAUWELT International spoke with both, Tiago Brandão and Benet Fité, about the tasks ahead.