Molson Coors Brewing reported higher sales volume, net sales and earnings per share for the fiscal first quarter ending March 30, 2008, in its press release, May 6.

First Quarter Highlights

Key results for the Company's fiscal first quarter ended March 30, 2008, compared to the fiscal first quarter ended April 1, 2007, include the following:

- Net sales increased 10.4 percent to $1.36 billion.

- Net sales per barrel increased 7.4 percent.

- Sales volume increased 2.8 percent to 9.1 million barrels, or 10.7 million hectoliters (HLs).

- Total Company sales-to-retail (STRs) rose 4.6 percent. U.S. STRs rose 6.6 percent, while Canada STRs were up 2.5 percent. U.K. sales volume increased 1.0 percent.

- Cost of goods sold per barrel increased 5.5 percent.

- Marketing, general and administrative expenses rose 10.0 percent to $436.6 million.

- After-tax income from continuing operations, a U.S. GAAP earnings measure, was $46.1 million, up 140.1 percent from $19.2 million in the first quarter of 2007. This increase was attributable to strong business performance in the U.S. and Canada and a lower effective tax rate, partially offset by accelerated incentive compensation expense and one-time debt extinguishment costs.

- Underlying after-tax earnings were $59.1 million, or ...More Info

Denmark's largest brewer Carlsberg AS, announced its interim results for the first quarter of 2008, in a press release, May 7.

• Organic volume growth of 4% and rising market shares in important markets. Continued market share gains in main BBH markets.

• Net revenue climbed 6% to a total of DKK 9.4bn (DKK 8.9bn in 2007). Calculated in local currencies, net revenue climbed 9%.

• Price increases and improved product mix across the markets more than offset the effect of rising raw material prices.

• Operating profit for beverage activities was DKK 381m. The corresponding figure for the first quarter of 2007 (adjusted for gains of DKK 58m on the sale of real estate in Poland) was DKK 345m, an underlying improvement of DKK 36m or 10% (DKK +61m in local currency or +18%). The result comes in the wake of good business development and in all regions the underlying business was ahead of the earnings plans made.

• Operating profit for the Group up 13% and 19% in local currencies.

• Ahead of the acquisition of the activities of Scottish & Newcastle plc (S&N), detailed planning of the forthcoming process has been carried out to help ensure rapid and ...More Info

UK-based Cobra Beer is planning to acquire three more breweries in India by 2012, taking its total number of breweries in the country to 12 from the present 9, Financial Express published May 6. The company has created a warchest of $100 million towards acquisition and setting up of breweries by this period.

''These three breweries will come up in Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra and either Rajashthan, Haryana or Punjab in the north,'' company's chairman Karan Bilimoria told Fe.

''The money for the breweries will be raised through debt,'' Bilimoria added.

Bilimoria, however, refused to speak on the exact details of the acquisition and said that the talks are on and one of the acquisitions is likely to happen over the next two months.

Asked the company was going for the acquisition route instead of setting up greenfield breweries, Bilimoria said that it takes more than a year to set up a greenfield brewery and therefore the acquisition route is preferred.

With the acquisition of the targeted breweries the company plans to augment its capacity from the present 5 million cases to 16-17 million cases annually.

The company, at present has breweries at nine locations in the country like Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar , Orissa, Madhya Pradesh, ...More Info

Spendrups Bryggeri AB has agreed to acquire Bergslagen-based Hellefors Bryggeri AB in a move which creates Sweden's largest brewery, Spendrups has said in a statement, according to FlexNews, May 5.

Family-owned Hellefors Bryggeri produces cider and soft drinks for the Swedish and Finnish markets, whilst Spendrups Bryggeri manufactures and sells beer, cider and soft drinks under various brands, such as Heineken, Loka and Spendrups.

The companies complement each other well: Spendrup sees strong growth potential in Hellefors’ own brands, a sector it wishes to focus on, and it can call on its financial resources and strong market position to help Hellefors grow.

Financial details of the deal weren’t disclosed.

Baltika Breweries, the leader on the Russian beer market, announces its results for the first 3 months of 2008, in a press release, May 7.

The growth in sales of the title brand Baltika as well as the licensed brands development facilitated further premiumisation of the Company’s brand portfolio leading to the significant revenue growth in Q1 2008 (+13.3%).

EBIT margin dynamics resulted from the raw materials, transportation and energy costs growth, temporary depreciation and maintenance costs share increase in low season.

Within 2008 Baltika is planning to eliminate most of the negative external factors by further premiumisation of brand portfolio, by optimization in logistics, by decreasing depreciation and other fixed costs share through starting up Novosibirsk brewery operations at the full production capacity as well as by the agricultural project expansion.

In Q1 2008, Baltika’s sales volume amounted to 9.0 million hectolitres (+2.5% compared to Q1 2007), of which 8.8 million hectolitres was beer, an increase of 2.7% year on year.

Baltika sales grew ahead of the market

According to Company estimates, as been forecasted, the Russian beer market developed slowly, the growth amounted to 1.7%. Mainly this is explained by the tough comparables with the previous year high performance when the market was driven ...More Info

The rising cost of malt, which has almost doubled in prices since last fall, is expected to drive up the cost of beer this summer, CBC News reported May 5.

The rising cost of malt, which has almost doubled in prices since last fall, is expected to drive up the cost of beer this summer.

Independent Canadian breweries are warning consumers that the cost of pouring a pint may soon rise, due to soaring malt and hops costs, as well as gasoline price hikes.

"There's a little bit of fear out there now about what's happening and what's coming next," said Peter Bulut Jr. of the Toronto-based Great Lakes Brewery.

Malt has almost doubled in price since last fall, increasing from $450 a metric tonne to $800. Hops and barley costs are also on the rise and breweries are contending with high gasoline prices in bringing their product to market.

Rising grain and energy costs have driven up the price of food around the world, swelling grocery bills.

Bulut says his brewery experiments with different varieties of hops and malts in small quantities. He says his company doesn't enjoy the same benefits as larger breweries that have long-term contracts — which cushion price hikes — with ...More Info

Australia's output of barley is set to rebound sharply this year from last year's drought-hit levels, the country's leading private forecaster and a major bank said, according to Reuters, May 6.

Higher grains and oilseeds output in Australia would help ease shortages that have lifted world prices to record highs in recent months.

Barley output is expected to jump 57 percent in 2008/09 to 9.54 million tonnes, Australian Crop Forecasters said.

Good subsoil moisture in northern New South Wales state, in the east, and in Western Australia, offered the best potential for a significantly increased 2008/09 production, National Australia Bank (NAB) said.

Australian Crop Forecasters said winter crops were still dependent on good autumn rainfall.

Drought began to ease in the final months of 2007 and in the first two months of 2008, but dry weather has returned in the last two months in eastern growing districts.

So far only Western Australia has had reasonable opening rain to allow full-scale planting of winter crops to proceed, Australian Crop Forecasters said.

"The east side needs a good soaking, minimum of 50 millimetres, to get a good planting under way," the group's principal Ron Storey said.

"In the big picture, the east coast remains very dry and will need to ...More Info

Prices of EU new crop malting barley dropped substantially during April, according to analysts, May 2. The trend developed in a very thin trade between second hand traders, while farmers and coops abstained almost completely: French 2row spring barley Sebastian, basis July, FOB Creil EUR 245, 2row winter Vanessa and 6row winter Esterel EUR 220,-, 6row winter Cervoise EUR 205,-, FOB Moselle plus 10,-. Danish 2row spring, basis October, FOB seaport, EUR 248,-, U.K. 2row spring, same parity, EUR 245,-. Czech 2row spring , ex harvest, ex silo, CZK 6000,- (EUR 238,-). South German 2row spring, delivered malthouse, ex harvest, EUR 275,-, Oct-Dec 285,-.

For comparison French feed barley traded at EUR 180,- September/December, CIF Holland, equal EUR 165,-, July, FOB Creil. The Euronext wheat market closed at EUR 199,- August. The premium of 2row spring malting barley is EUR 80,- as compared to feed barley. It is only EUR 46,- compared to wheat, which is low.

Multinationals sourcing barley from Rajasthan for production of beer is increasing. After Pepsico India recently entered into an agreement with farmers in Rajasthan for producing barley for UB group, one of the leading global brewers, SABMiller announced doubling its barley sourcing from 7,090 tonne to 15,000 tonne, Financial Express published May 7.

“About 6,000 barley farmers in Rajasthan will become part of SAB Miller’s key supply chain in 2008,” Graham Mackay, chief executive, SABMiller said in London.

After initiating contract farming in Punjab for producing high yielding basmati rice, mangoes, potatoes,chillies, peanuts and barley, PepsiCo India has also initiatedbBarley cultivation in two districts of northern Rajasthan.

PepsiCo has signed a three year memorandum of understanding (MoU) with more than 1,200 farmers from Sriganganagar and Hanumangarh districts of Rajasthan for producing high yielding malt barley for supplying to the United Breweries group (UB) for production of beer. Pepsico has initiated the barley farming in more than 10,000 acres of land for producing 10,000 tonnes of barley.

Under the MoU which was signed in 2003, Pepsico India provides high quality seeds, technical knowledge to farmers for producing high yielding barley which could be supplied to UB group.

“The UB group approached us because of our experience in ...More Info

The Japanese breweries are still the most important customers for Czech hops, the critical situation on the hop market lead to the increase in hop imports, Hop-growers Union of the Czech Republic has recently reported.

With regards to the below average results of hop crops 2006 and 2007 in the Czech Republic there was also a reduction in the amount of exported hops. In the case of hop pellets there was a 15 % reduction compare to year 2006. In the past period there was a decrease mainly in the export of cone hops, the quantity of exported hop pellets remained in the last 14 years stable at around 3300 t of hop pellets (which is around 4200 t of dry cone hops).

The main part of hop pellets was again exported to Japan, altogether 1750 t. The Japanese breweries Asahi, Kirin, Sapporo and Suntory are the largest customers for Czech hops and take around 40 % of the Czech hop crop (variety Saaz).

TOP 10 destinations of hops from the Czech Republic in 2007:

1. Japan 2. Germany 3. Poland 4. China 5. Russia 6. Great Britain 7. South Africa 8. Belgium 9. Vietnam 10. India

„In the last ten years hops and hop products from the Czech Republic were directly exported to over 73 countries of ...More Info

EVA ČONKOVÁ1, ANNA LACIAKOVÁ1, IGOR ŠTYRIAK (2), LUDWIK CZERWIECKI (3) and GRAŻYNA WILCZYŃSKA (3) 1) Institute of Pharmacy and Pharmacology, University of Veterinary Medicine in Košice, Košice, Slovak Republic; 2)Institute of Animal Physiology, Slovak Academy of Sciences, Košice, Slovak Republic; 3) Institute of Agricultural and Food Biotechnology, Warsaw, Poland

Abstract
ČONKOVÁ E., LACIAKOVÁ A., ŠTYRIAK I., CZERWIECKI L., WILCZINSKA G. (2006): Fungal contamination and the levels of mycotoxins (DON and OTA) in cereal samples from Poland and East Slovakia. Czech J. Food Sci., 24: 33–40. The cereal samples were taken immediately after harvest from the selected localities of Poland (45 samples) and East Slovakia (60 samples). Fungal contamination of these samples was investigated and subsequently the presence of two important mycotoxins, deoxynivalenol (DON) and ochratoxin A (OTA), was quantitatively examined. Concerning mould contamination, no difference was observed between the samples from Poland and East Slovakia. The highest incidence was observed of Fusarium, Aspergillus, and Penicillium genera. However, most of the investigated samples of wheat, rye, and barley contained less than 104 cfu/g. The limit 750 ppb for DON in cereals and their products, recommended by the European Mycotoxin Awareness Network (EMAN), was exceeded only by one wheat sample (4.5%) from Poland, but by seven wheat samples (14.6%) from Slovakia. None cereal sample investigated for OTA exceeded the allowed limit – 5 µg/kg. Keywords: wheat; rye; barley; microscopic fungi; ochratoxin A (OTA); deoxynivalenol (DON) ... Load full article, 8 pages, 206 Kb, PDF file