Tsingtao Brewery Co Ltd plans to purchase Jinan Beer Group for RMB 250 million, China Knowledge cited undisclosed sources on June, 5.

An insider close to the situation revealed that the acquisition may not include the land use rights or the workshop. The production of Jinan Beer will be transferred to the Tsingtao factory located in Jinan high-tech development zone.

Tsingtao Brewery has reached a preliminary agreement with Shandong Commercial Group, the owner of Jinan Beer, and the acquisition agreement is expected to be signed early this month, the source claimed.

Tsingtao Brewery was not available for comment.

The acquisition will help Tsingtao compete with China Resources Breweries Co Ltd in Shandong Province.

Tsingtao Brewery entered the beer market in Jinan in 1997. It built a workshop in Jinan with production capacity of 400,000 tons in April 2007 to better meet demand in the next five to ten years.

Australians do not let the global financial crisis affect their beer habits, on the contrary, they are even willing to spend a bit more for their brew these days, the Wall Street Journal posted on June, 4.

That's good news for beer companies in Australia like Lion Nathan Ltd. and Foster's Group Ltd., although it's uncertain whether beer, particularly the high-end brands, can continue to grow at this pace in the face of an expected consumer slowdown.

Domestic premium beer sales were up 18.6% and imported premium beer was up 15.3% in March from a year earlier, according to data from Nielsen Co. The only category that suffered was low-alcohol beer where sales contracted 9.2%.

Recent anecdotes indicate that overall, beer is in vogue with Metcash Ltd., which delivers beer to bottle shops, convenience stores and independent grocers, saying their beer volumes have risen 25% for the year ended April 30th. Lion Nathan says core beer markets have "remained robust despite economic circumstances."

This might not sound unusual for Australia, which has a reputation for being a beer drinking country, but it bucks a trend over many years of Australian drinkers switching to wine.

Australia’s brewers have been innovating in recent years, ...More Info

Carlsberg India, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Danish brewer Carlsberg, will set up two more breweries to tap the growing market in southern India, a top company official was quoted as saying by Financial Chronicle on June, 3.

The company already set up four greenfield breweries two years ago in the country and markets all-malt three beer brands from its global portfolio – Carlsberg, Okocim Palone and the recently-launched Tuborg.

“We plan to set up two more greenfield breweries in south India to tap the growing clients in the southern states with a total investment of Rs 150 crore (1 crore = ten million) in the next financial year,” Pradeep Gidwani, managing director, Carlsberg India, said.

At present, the company has four breweries in Alwar in Rajasthan, Paunta Sahib in Himachal Pradesh, Aurangabadin Maharash-tra and Hooghly in West Bengal. Till date, it has invested over Rs 250 crore in India.

“We have been growing fast and the response to our brands is overwhelming. About 55 per cent of the beer is consumed in the south with the largest guzzlers in Andhra Pradesh, followed by Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Karnataka and Rajasthan,” Gidwani said.

Last year, 180 million cases of beer were sold in the country. The beer ...More Info

Following the government’s decision to increase the excise tax on beer, Ukrainian brewers prognosticate an increase in beer prices, Gazeta.ua reported on June, 4.

The increase may reach about UAH0.25 per a 0.5 litre bottle of beer.

“As the excise tax on beer has been increased to UAH0.6, the price of a bottle will grow by average UAH0.2-0.25,” Alexandr Slobodyan, Obolon brewery president, said.

The new excise rate will come into force in the second half of this year. Mr. Slobodyan believes beer price hike should be expected already in July.

Petr Chernishov, head of Carlsberg Group Ukraine, said the company’s price policy will be revised in the nearest future.

Mr. Chernishov said the prices of beer will grow by about UAH0.5 per litre.

He reminded that Ukraine’s beer consumption has been falling since the second half of 2008, and the latest excise tax increase will only aggravate the negative trend and block the development of the nation’s beer market.

“We had hoped up to the last moment that in determining the new excise rate good sense would prevail over somebody’s momentary conclusions and unjustified emotions. At the moment, it is difficult to make any forecasts regarding the further developments since the situation remains ambiguous,” Ludmila Nakonechnaya, ...More Info

Japan’s two largest brewers, Asahi and Kirin, plan to increase by 30% their sales volumes in Russia, ITAR-TASS reported on June, 5.

Asahi Dry beer has been produced on license by Russia’s Baltika Breweries since April, 2008. In 2009, according to sources, its sales (together with the imported beer) will be increased to 11.8 mln bottles, which is 30% more than last year.

Japan’s No.1 brewer Kirin is so far lagging behind Asahi, but also plans to increase beer sales in Russia by 30%, it is reported.

The full warehouses of maltsters and the lack of export demand for feed barley kept the lid on barley prices during the past two weeks, even though prices for other grains did see some strengthening during the same period, Farm & Ranch Guide reported on June, 4.

According to Randy Brad from Valley Grain Services in Casselton, N.D., barley will sit on the sidelines this time as other commodity prices increase.

“We're seeing the speculators get into the market and cause prices for wheat, corn and soybeans to run up, but this time around I don't think barley is going to follow like it has in the past,” Brag said. “For a while during this last run, barley was priced higher than corn, but this time that isn't going to happen.

“We've got the California barley harvest ready to start next week, so we have new crop coming into the market. The rest of the world had a good barley crop last year so they are working on existing stocks, so all the demand at this time is basically in the United States,” he continued.

“And even though there were less acres contracted this year by the maltsters, they are backed up with enough ...More Info

The Malting Barley Committee of the Institute of Brewing and Distilling posted on June, 5 the updated list of malting barley varieties recommended for 2009.

“With the increased requirement for grain distilling malt it is necessary to identify barleys which are recommended for the different distilling purposes.”

“The outcome was the promotion of Quench to Full Approval for brewing use, the promotion of Belgravia to Full Approval for malt distilling and grain distilling use, the promotion of Concerto to Provisional Approval 1 for brewing and malt distilling use and the promotion of Forensic to Provisional Approval 1 for malt distilling and grain distilling use,” the Committee said.

Wintmalt was removed from trials and Appaloosa and Tartan were removed from the approved list.

Decanter remains on the list for grain distilling but has been removed for malt distilling.

The list of varieties approved for brewing use (harvest 2010) is as follows:

Winter varieties with full approval: Pearl, Flagon, Cassata;

Spring varieties with full approval: Optic, Cocktail, NFC Tipple, Westminster, Quench;

Spring varieties with provisional approval 1: Concerto

No winter varieties were given full approval for malt distilling use. The spring ones are: Optic, Cocktail, Oxbridge, Publican, and Belgravia. Concerto and Forensic were given provisional approval 1 for ...More Info

P. Gabriel, M. Dienstbier, D. Matoulkova, K. Kosar and K. Sigler

Abstract:
J. Inst. Brew. 114(3), 270–276, 2008 The optimised acidification power test (APT) of brewer’s yeast quality includes storing the yeast slurry at 2°C under beer (AP remains constant for up to 6 days), a 15 min sample equilibration to room temperature, decantation, and washing by triple centrifugation in deionised water. The final yeast pellet keeps its AP for up to 6 h at room temperature under water and thus the APT does not need to be performed immediately after yeast collection. The correct AP value (maximum acidification produced by given yeast) is determined at 25 ± 0.1°C in a 15 mL sample containing >5% glucose and >1.5 g yeast wet weight. The cell concentration is conveniently measured as absorbance (A660). Cell flocculation and/or sedimentation that can distort APT results can be prevented by stirring the sample at >200 rpm. The AP of yeast of different generations used to pitch brewery fermentations in cylindroconical tanks had a very low correlation with the wort half-attenuation time (T1/2) due to large scatter, while each yeast generation separately showed a clear T 1/2 - AP relationship. The lowest AP of yeast cropped from cylindroconical tanks was displayed by the first cropped fraction. Post-cropping cooling had no effect on AP. Variations in pitching yeast vitality and their effect on the outcome of a brewery fermentation can be masked by variations in pitching rate, wort composition, ambient conditions in the cylindroconical tanks and other factors. Key words: Acidification power, brewery practice, optimised AP test, wort attenuation, yeast cropping, yeast quality. Load full article, 7 pages, 339 Kb, PDF file