Kirin Holdings Company, Limited ("Kirin") announced on January, 26 revised forecasts for the year ending December 31, 2008, based on the recent business trends. The previous forecasts for the year were announced on November 4, 2008.

The company believes its consolidated sales over the reporting period are to constitute 2.3 trln yen (2.32 trln in the previous forecast).

Consolidated operating income forecast did not change (145 bln yen).

Kirin’s consolidated ordinary income is expected to be 103 bln yen in the year ended December, 31, 2008.

The company reduced its previous net income estimate of 104 bln yen to 80 bln in its latest forecast.

San Miguel Corp. announced on January, 28 it is spinning off 830.6 million dollars' worth of brewing assets as it pursues a radical shift into new lines of business, AFP communicated on the same day.

The board of San Miguel Corp, one of the Philippines' largest companies, approved the sale of its domestic beer brands, related intellectual property rights, and real estate used in the brewing business, it said.

Its San Miguel Brewery Inc. unit bought the brands for 32 billion pesos (680.8 million dollars) and land worth 6.8 billion pesos, the listed companies said in separate statements.

Part of the real estate was sold to San Miguel Brewery's pension fund for 239 million pesos.

San Miguel Corp. plans to sell portions of its packaging business this year.

Earlier this month San Miguel Corp. and Japan's Kirin Holdings Co. Ltd. announced they had signed an agreement to negotiate the sale of up to 43.25 percent of San Miguel Brewery to Kirin by February.

The deal would leave San Miguel Corp. - Southeast Asia's largest food and beverage group - with a 51 percent stake.

Kirin separately holds a 20 percent stake in San Miguel Corp.

San Miguel Brewery Inc. shares rose to the highest in four months in ...More Info

According to data by the Union of Russian Brewers, the nation’s annual beer production dropped 0.6 percent to 114.04 mln hl in 2008, The Moscow Times reported on January, 28.

Russian beer output fell for the first time since 1996 last year as the financial crisis hurt consumer confidence, the Union informed.

"Lower purchasing power as a result of the economic crisis" contributed to the drop in output, Vyacheslav Mamontov, chairman of the union's executive committee, said in a statement. "Unfavorable weather conditions," mainly a cool summer, also had "a negative influence," he added.

An increase in the country's beer excise taxes in 2008, as well as higher energy prices, raised production costs, also hurting output, Mamontov said.

The current year, however, will see a small volume growth of the beer market, experts maintain. Alexei Voinov, Ochakovo Marketing Director, believes that the Russian beer market will grow 1 – 2% in 2009. This forecast is shared by Tatyana Bobrovskaya, Broker Credit Service analyst. Andrei Malafeev, Efes Breweries - Moscow Public Relations Manager, says that the company is expecting a stable negative market dynamics in the first four months of 2009, but the general forecast for the year is positive. “In any case, weather will ...More Info

Miller Lite's sales volume dropped 3.5% in 2008, ending its status as the top-selling brand for MillerCoors LLC, The Journal Sentinel reported on January, 27.

Last year, Miller Lite’s sales totalled 17.7 million barrels, down from 18.35 million barrels in 2007, according to trade publication Beer Marketer's Insights. Meanwhile, Coors Light's sales increased 2.6%, to 17.75 million barrels compared to 17.3 million barrels.

Coors Light and Miller Lite are the nation's No. 3 and No. 4 brands. The top selling brands are Bud Light, at 42 million barrels, up 0.1%, and Budweiser, at 23.1 million barrels, down 6.1%.

Rounding out the top 10 are Natural Light, Corona Extra, Busch Light, Busch, High Life and Heineken.

Overall U.S. beer sales increased 0.5% in 2008.

Asahi Breweries Ltd. will seek to quadruple its annual overseas sales from Y50 billion at present to Y200 billion through aggressive mergers and acquisitions, President Hitoshi Ogita was quoted as saying by Kyodo News on January, 28.

"We would like to boost overseas sales to Y200 billion, or the equivalent of 10% of our overall sales, at an early date," Ogita said in a recent interview. At present, overseas sales account for 3% to 5% of Asahi’s global sales.

The brewer will seek to accomplish its goal by speeding up acquisitions of foreign companies, placing the highest priority on takeovers of Asian firms, as the Japanese market is shrinking due to the rapid aging of the population, he said.

Asahi Breweries will be able to post an operating profit from its overseas operations in 2010, although the operations are currently haemorrhaging red ink, he said.

Asahi Breweries said on January, 23 it will acquire a 19.99% stake in Tsingtao Brewery Co., China's second-largest brewer, for roughly Y60 billion. In April, it will start talks with Tsingtao Brewery on cooperation in the procurement of beer ingredients and beer production.

The top Japanese brewer has also expressed interest in acquiring companies ...More Info

UK’s pubs and bars served 130 million less pints in the final quarter of last year – a drop of nearly 10 per cent – compared to the same period in 2007, The Publican reported on January, 27.

This means the pubs served 1.4 million fewer daily pints in the last three months of 2008.

The UK Quarterly Beer Barometer also showed a 6.5 per cent drop in off-trade sales in the last three months of 2008.

Overall beer sales, across the on and off-trade, are down 8.3 per cent - the highest fourth quarter fall since records began in 1997.

And on-trade beer sales for the whole of 2008 fell 9.3 per cent, according to the figures, published by the British Beer & Pub Association (BBPA).

However, overall, off-trade sales for the year only dropped 0.2 per cent.

Rob Hayward, the BBPA’s chief executive, said the figures highlighted the “extreme economic pressures hitting Britain’s beer and pub sector” and claimed the government’s beer tax revenues are now down £181m since last March’s Budget.

The alcohol tax escalator was only “making a difficult situation worse”, he added, and by 2012 the tax on a pint of beer will have shot up by 40 ...More Info

SABMiller plc announced on January, 28 that its Romanian subsidiary, Ursus Breweries, has acquired a 71% interest in the Romanian brewer Bere Azuga.

Bere Azuga, which produces the Azuga and Valea Prahovei brands, operates from a single brewery located some 30 kilometres from the city of Brasov, in the central Transylvanian region of Romania and has an estimated market share of 0.6%, the world’s second-largest brewer posted in a statement.

Stephan Maria Weber, Managing Director of Ursus Breweries, commented:

"Ursus Breweries is pleased to add one of the most recognised Romanian brands to its portfolio. The acquisition of Bere Azuga, which has a strong Romanian heritage, illustrates our determination to offer our customers a choice of high quality brands that span a range of different drinking occasions."

Bere Azuga is listed on the Bucharest stock exchange and its market capitalisation on the last day of trading prior to this announcement was €9.3 million, based on a share price of €1.73. The value of the gross assets acquired is €24.8 million.

In accordance with local law and regulations, Ursus Breweries will seek the approval of the competition authority and in due course will launch a public offer for the shares it does not own.

For 2008-09, barley exports are forecast to fall by 56% (to 2,500 thousand metric tonnes) from 2007-08, due to lower feed barley shipments, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada communicated on January, 26.

Carry-out barley stocks are forecast to rise by 34% (to 2,100 thousand metric tonnes) but remain below the 5 year average. Feed barley prices are forecast to fall by about C$30/t from last year.

For 2009-10, barley seeded area is forecast to rise by 3% (to 3,915 thousand ha) with production down by 7% (11,000 thousand metric tonnes). Total supply is forecast to fall by 2% (from 13,389 thousand metric tonnes in 2008-2009 to 13,135 thousand metric tonnes in 2009-2010).

Domestic feed use is also expected to decrease slightly due to the lower projected livestock numbers.

Total exports are forecast to be unchanged at 2,500 thousand metric tonnes. Carry-out stocks are expected to fall by 5% to 2,000 thousand metric tonnes. The off-Board price of feed barley is forecast to be unchanged from 2008-09.

France’s barley crop is estimated at 12.3 mln tonnes in 2008/2009, the ONIGC reported on January, 14.

The market availability of the French barley is estimated at 10.6 mln tonnes, taking into account the stock at the beginning of the season (0.7 mln tonnes) and the imports estimated at 50,000 tonnes of barley.

Domestic use of barley is maintained at 2.5 mln tonnes, of which 1.6 mln tonnes for feed use.

Sales to EU nations estimate remained at last month’s level of 3.4 mln tonnes of barley.

Exports to third countries were revised downwards to 1.4 mln tonnes of grain (- 250,000 tonnes from last month’s estimate), under pressure of Black Sea competition.

French malt exports are expected to remain at last year’s 1.2 mln tonnes.

End stocks are estimated to make 2.1 mln tonnes in 2008/2009, a little higher than last month’s forecast of 1.9 mln tonnes due to reduced prospects of export.

As from the beginning of January, the feed barley prices have gained some strength, ONIGC reported. Malting barley prices, on the contrary, are heading downwards since 2007/2008, it is stated.

As for 2009, winter barley acreage may slightly increase to more than 1.3 mln ha (+ 0.7% compared to the area planted to ...More Info

The American Malting Barley Association, Inc. (AMBA) announced its recommended malting barley varieties for planting in 2009 on January, 27.

The recommended six-row malting barley varieties are: Drummond, Lacey, Legacy, Rasmusson, Robust, Stellar-ND, and Tradition.

The recommended two-row malting barley varieties are: AC Metcalfe, CDC Copeland, Charles, Conlon, Conrad, Craft, Harrington, Merit, Scarlett.

Rasmusson, a six-row, and Charles, a two-row winter barley variety, have been added to the list for the first time, AMBA posted.

Growers are encouraged to contact their local elevator, grain handler or processor to gauge market demand for any variety grown in their region prior to seeding, the Association strongly recommends.

Masaaki Yano, Hideki Tsuda, Takeo Imai, Yutaka Ogawa and Motoo Ohkochi

Abstract:
J. Inst. Brew. 114(3), 230–238, 2008 Free amino nitrogen (FAN) and other low-molecular-weight nitrogen compounds (LNC) are highly important as nutrients for yeast. Many different types of low-malt beer exist around the world, some of which are produced with barley as an adjunct. In these cases, inhibitors contained in barley are known to influence the amount of LNC in wort. Accordingly, it is important to investigate which proteinase class is key in producing these compounds. By investigating the relationship between the FAN contained in wort produced from malt and barley (barley adjunct wort) and malt proteinase activity, it was found that cysteine proteinase and 1,10-orthophenanthroline (O-Phen)-inhibitable metallo proteinases had a significant correlation to the barley adjunct wort FAN levels. In addition, the relationship between malting conditions and these proteinase activities was investigated and the conditions defined for maximal production of proteinases as follows: steeping degree, 50%; germination temperature, 12°C; germination days, 6 days; water spray, 3 times and concentration of gibberellic acid, 10 mg/kg (barley). Key words: Barley, Load full article, 9 pages, 670 Kb, PDF file