Chile's largest brewer, Compania Cervecerias Unidas S.A. (CCU) announced on January 6 preliminary fourth quarter and full year 2005 consolidated volumes. In the fourth quarter of 2005 beer sales volume increased by 9.5 % in Chile up to 1,387,105 hl, and by 9.3 % in Argentina up to 744,878 hl.

For the entire year 2005 CCU’s beer sales volume increased by 9.5% year-on-year in Chile up to 4,17 million hl and by 7.9% in Argentina up to 2.22 million hl.

CCU plans to release its consolidated fourth quarter results by the end of February.

CCU is a diversified beverage company operating principally in Chile and Argentina. CCU is the largest Chilean brewer, the second-largest Argentine brewer, the third-largest Chilean soft drink producer, the second-largest Chilean wine producer, the largest Chilean mineral water producer, one of the largest Chilean pisco producer and also participates in the confectionery industry in Chile. The Company has licensing and/or joint venture arrangements with Heineken Brouwerijen B.V., Anheuser-Busch Companies Inc., PepsiCo Inc., Paulaner Brauerei AG, Schweppes Holdings Limited and Watt’s Alimentos S.A. For more information, visit www.ccu-sa.com.

Kirin Brewery Co.'s operating profit for 2005 slightly topped its own forecast and hit a record high thanks to strong sales of beer-like drinks, business daily Nihon Keizai reported on January 6, according to Reuters.

Japan's second-biggest brewer will post a group operating profit of 112 billion yen ($965 million), above its own forecast in August of 110 billion yen, for the calendar year, the paper said.

Kirin introduced a so-called "third-type" beer, Nodogoshi Nama, in April, snatching top share of the growing lower-priced segment -- in which it now controls about 35 percent -- from Sapporo Holdings Ltd .

The product, along with the company's popular low-malt "happoshu" brews, boosted Kirin's sales in the third quarter by 5 percent while the overall beer market shrank.

But the paper said Kirin's consolidated sales for 2005 slipped 2 percent to 1.63 trillion yen, falling short of its own forecast by about 20 billion yen, hit by poor sales at its subsidiary Kirin Beverage Corp.

Danish brewing force, Carlsberg, has sold its remaining 11.86 % stake in Hite Brewery Co., South Korea's largest beermaker, the Korean beer company company announced on January 10. Carlsberg invested about 319 billion won, or US$ 325 million, ending a six and a half year investment in Hite Brewery, according to Asia Pulse.

Carlsberg sold its 2.27 million shares in Hite for 140,158 won per share in after-hours trading on Monday, Hite said in a regulatory filing.

Expected area seeded with barley in 2006 is to remain almost unchanged at about 590,000 ha, H. Abildstrom & Co ApS reported on December 30 2005. In 2005 barley area was of 594,000 ha of which 159,300 ha with malting barley. For comparison in 2004 barley area was 531,800 ha of which 136,200 ha with malting barley.

In 2005 Finland harvested 2,102,900 tonnes of barley of which 607,200 tonnes of malting barley of which acceptable/accessible for malt production 300,000 tonnes; Domestic demand malting barley 200,000 tonnes; Theoretical exportable surplus: 100,000 tonnes.

However:
1) Not all Finnish surplus can be exported, as several foreign buyers do not accept
the main variety SAANA,
2) others do not want SCARLETT as having enough of this variety themselves,
3) a lot of malting barley is situated closer to intervention silos than ports and/or
railway junctions causing Finnish malting barley to follow the feed into intervention.

H. Abildstrom & Co ApS’s estimate for Finnish exports: would hardly exceed 30.000 tonnes.

Prognosis barley varieties to be sown in Finland Spring 2006:

SCARLETT 35%
SAANA (mainly feed) 25%
PRESTIGE 10%
BARKE 10%
ANNABEL 7%
BRAEMAR 3%
MAREN 2%
OTHERS 8%

OTHERS can be Carafe, Sebastian, Power, Inari.