Belgian brewer InBev has agreed to take over Anheuser-Busch Cos.' 27% stake in China's Tsingtao Brewery Co. once its planned takeover of the U.S. brewer is completed, MarketWatch cited Tsingtao Brewery’s statement as of September, 9.

InBev signed an agreement with Anheuser-Busch, Tsingtao Brewery and Tsingtao Brewery's largest shareholder, Tsingtao Brewery Group Co., on the matter on September, 5, the Chinese brewer said.

Anheuser-Busch originally entered into a strategic investment agreement with Tsingtao Brewery in October 2002, it was reported.

A certain nervousness has been created by disappointing beer sales figures in the early months of 2008, and even more so by the announcements of new malthouse construction in Australia, Argentina, Brazil, France, Belgium, Germany, U.K., Czech, Poland, Russia and Ukraine.

However, all announced additional production would be absorbed by the market, if the rise of beer sales of past years continued in future, but would become a burden in case of a recession in the beer market, analysts state.

Recent news sound a bit relaxing, a number of international brewing groups have published positive beer sales figures. Even the usually ailing Germany had a good month of July and has reduced its annual sales minus to 0.7 % as compared to 2007.

The worst figure comes from Japan; total minus in the first half of 2008 is minus 4.2 %, but the “real” beer minus 7.6 %.

U.S. craft beer output had grown by 6.5 % during the first semester and enjoys a further healthy growth since. Craft brewers use almost double the amount of malt per Hl beer than the three giant brewers of the U.S.

Carlsberg UK is the latest company to point to the rise in costs of raw ingredients after announcing a price increase, the Publican published on September, 8.

A statement from Carlsberg said: "Carlsberg UK can confirm that it will be increasing its wholesale price by an average of 2.3% with effect from 6 October.

"We are committed to delivering efficiencies across all areas of business in order to absorb the increased costs and reduce the potential impact on our customers. This has been the case this year as our price increases have been significantly lower than our competitors.

"The rise in costs of such items as raw materials and utilities has been unprecedented, therefore on this occasion we have been left with no alternative.

"Customer support, brand growth and innovation remain at the heart of our strategy and we will continue with this support during this difficult trading period."

Carlsberg cited rising costs including raw materials, with malt up 50% and hops more than 100%, as well as rising utility prices.

The statement added that it had been “delivering efficiencies” across the business in an attempt to absorb the costs.

The announcement follows a similar move by Coors last week. The Carling and Groslch brewer is ...More Info

Dutch beer brewer Heineken will consolidate its recent acquisitions in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) rather than buy more breweries, Austrian news agency APA reported on September, 9.

With earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) of 177 million euros (253 million dollars) in the first half of this year, the CEE division of the world's third largest brewer faced a 12-per-cent decline in operating profits.

"High production costs, the economic slowdown and unfavourable weather conditions put us to the test," Heineken president for the CEE region Nico Nusmeier said in a statement.

Experts say Heineken's Vienna-based CEE division increased its sales by 14 per cent to 1.76 billion euros in the six months until June, compared to the same period last year mainly because it bought 11 breweries in the past 12 months.

Now it was time to consolidate the acquisitions, Nusmeier was quoted as saying.

Beer consumption is stagnating in developed markets such as the United States and Western Europe, while in CEE, output volumes continue to rise as purchasing power grows and customers switch from vodka to beer, the company said.

In July and August, Heineken bought four breweries from the Drinks Union in the Czech Republic, as well as the ...More Info

Molson Coors Brewing Co. continues to look for possible acquisitions as the consolidation wave in the beer industry goes on, the company’s CEO Peter Swinburn was quoted as saying by MarketWatch on September, 4.

Without specifying what types of companies the beer giant may have in mind, Swinburn said it's in a better position to weigh joint ventures and other deals now that it's managed to pay down debt.

"There's not an awful lot out there...but we're in a better position to play that game now because of our stronger balance sheet," he said.

The company will continue to cut costs as it faces off against the soon-to-merge Anheuser-Busch and InBev.

The CEO declined to comment specifically on a lawsuit against the company by two Ohio beer distributors, but said that most U.S. players support the streamlining process now underway.

Meanwhile, two Ohio beer distributors have filed a lawsuit against MillerCoors, Molson Coors’ joint venture with SABMiller, contending their terminations were illegal.

The lawsuit filed in federal court in Columbus this week charges that MillerCoors’ distributorship terminations in the state violate an Ohio law prohibiting beer franchises from being terminated “without just cause and notice.”

The claimants are Beverage Distributors Inc., of ...More Info

Beer produced abroad is in the doldrums in Russia, Pivnoe Delo published on September, 9. The market is tightly occupied by local brands. Only Tuborg managed to enter the top twenty best-sellers, and locally bottled at that. The share of beer brewed in Europe and the US in volume terms does not exceed 0.5% on the Russian market.

It is usually assumed that redivision of the market happened as a consequence of the August 1998 default. Western beer, for which prices were at the level of Russian analogues, sharply soared beyond mass consumer’s purse.

According to Anna Krasnopolskaya, Marketing Director of the Russian Distribution company Trade House „Pivo-Vody”, very little beer was produced in the country in the early nineties. Transnational behemoths were not interested in beer at that moment yet, she said.

During that era, practically all beers were imported in Russia and cost practically the same as domestic ones. But when dollar exchange rate changed drastically, prices for imported beer grew tenfold. As a consequence, many brands were withdrawn from the market.

Viktor Tamberg, an expert in food and brand strategies, disagrees with Ms Krasnopolskaya: “I remember the time well. All Swedish and Finnish producers were present in St. Petersburg: Pripps, Spendrup’s, ...More Info

The French group Malteurop, a subsidiary of the holding company SICLAE, of which the Champagne Céréales group is majority stockholder, has purchased the Russian company Belgorsolod, a subsidiary of the Ochakovo group, the French company’s official press release announced on September, 5.

Through this acquisition the world’s leading malt producer has extended the scope of its activity by locating on Europe’s largest beer market.

Belgorsolod and Malteurop are both specialists in processing barley into malt. It was decided that the new entity will take the name Malteurop Russia.

This acquisition, which comes after the group’s purchase of the American group ADM Malting in August 2008, further strengthens Malteurop’s position as the world’s leading malt producer.

Alain Le Floch, Malteurop’s Managing Director, said “This acquisition of a modern unit in Russia gives Malteurop a presence on the largest beer market in Europe. It confirms our strategy of development in a region that is undergoing strong growth, and strengthens Malteurop’s position as the benchmark supplier to the major brewing groups.”

Malteurop now has a strong presence on the world’s three leading beer markets (Europe, Asia, and North America) and industrial facilities on four continents (Europe, North America, Oceania, and Asia). The group’s strategy is a determined one: ...More Info

August has been a traditional holiday month with little activity in the domestic and international malt markets, analysts commented on September, 1.

As of September, 1, price levels, mostly nominal, for 2RS malt, crop 2008, delivery 2009, DDU breweries, are EUR 440,-/450,-.

FOB bulk in vessel in North European seaports, EUR 440,-, FOB bulk in container EUR 460,-. 6RW malt, variety Esterel, was quoted at EUR 20,- less at the beginning of the month.

There had been a small wave of domestic business for crop 2009 at prices, which were EUR 10,- higher than for the present crop, but that business dried up, when maltsters could not find barley offers for the next crop any more.

The large malt quantities sold under LTA’s have reduced the former pure sales activities very much. Brewers have covered fairly large open barley quantities under LTA’s in August, but those transactions are hardly noticed by others than the involved contract partners.

Latest barley crop estimates for the EU-27 range from 62.7 to 64.2 mln tons, five to seven mln tons more than last year, experts reported on September, 1.

According to experts, all EU countries except the Baltic Sea region harvested large crops, close to record levels.

In August weather turned foul all over Northern Europe. Harvest progressed very slowly and came often enough to a full stop in many places.

Most of the North European barley had been planted late March or early April, and the Baltic Sea countries had gone through a long drought period in May/June. One result was high protein contents and lower yields in Denmark and South Sweden. Rains and harvest delays did further damage, to yields, colour, and finally to the condition of barley, with the appearance of splits, pre-germination and fusarium.

As of September, 1, there was still much barley in the fields in the U.K., Sweden, Finland and Lithuania, analysts therefore postponed issuing a detailed S/D for EU malting barley. But it was already possible to say that EU has a good surplus of malting barley, thanks to the French super crop.

Besides, data show that the Iberian Peninsula and Southeast Europe are self-sufficient. Some ...More Info

China’s malting barley crop is not as good as earlier expected, as Inner Mongolia did not fulfil the high hopes for a good quality crop, experts reported on September, 1.

The country’s import estimates for the crop year range from 1.3 to 1.7 mln tons.

China already purchased around 150,000 tons of EU malting barley, mainly the variety Cervoise.

At the beginning of the month, latest paid prices CIF China were US$ 360,- per ton, Australia at US$ 410,- CIF and Canada at even higher prices did not sell yet.

The U.S. was plagued by dryness before and locally heavy rains during harvest, experts report. As a consequence, some industries accept proteins up to 14.5 % for six- and two-row barleys, also very low plumpness.

As of September, 1, prices for feed barley exw N. Dakota have improved to U.S $ 207,- per metric tonne, six-row malting barley delivered Minneapolis is quoted US$ 321,-, two-row malting exw Montana US$ 336,- (this price would be equivalent to US$ 414,- FOB Portland).

Supplies look tight, and analysts conclude that market prices are high enough to invite good imports from Canada.

Birthe Møller, Jose Luis Molina-Cano and Lars Munck

Abstract

J. Inst. Brew. 108(3), 294–302, 2002 In earlier studies concerning vigour, where subsamples are heattreated before germination there was found heat-sensitive as well as heat-resistant barley samples. The vigour model developed by Ellis and Roberts and further developed at Carlsberg, could only describe the heat-sensitive barleys. Seventeen samples of the “Alexis” variety grown widely in Europe were collected from the EBC trials in 1994 in order to see if heat resistance in barley was influenced by different growing conditions. We found both heat-sensitive samples following the vigour model as well as pronounced heat-resistant samples, but these were not divided according to growing conditions. The germination curves dependent on heat treatment and germination time were evaluated by Principal Component Analysis (PCA). Heat-resistant barley samples could be differentiated from heat-sensitive samples already after ½ h of heat treatment at 68°C (12% moisture) and after 3 days of germination. The barley samples were analysed with regard to malting quality. The PCA evaluation of the data divided the samples according to growing location, mainly due to differences in protein and
-glucan. However, the malting analyses could not describe the differences in heat resistance and sensitivity of the barleys. The biochemical background of the heat resistance found is discussed on the basis of literature. Our findings should give an experimental basis for exploiting a biochemical principle for heat resistance, which is formed during grain filling and consumed during storage and germination. Key words: Heat resistance, malting barley quality, principal component analysis, vigour. Load full article, 9 pages, 278 Kb, PDF file