Danish brewer Carlsberg declined to comment on whether it has any plans to lift its stake in Chinese Chongqing Brewery Co Ltd by buying a 12.25 percent state-owned holding, Reuters reported on April, 13.

Carlsberg, which already has a 17.5 percent stake in Chongqing Brewery, last year expressed interest in obtaining a larger stake in the Chinese brewer.

Chongqing Brewery said on April 11 its principal owner, Chongqing Beer Group which holds the state's 32.25 percent stake in the company, planned to reduce its holding to 20 percent.

Danske Bank said in a note to clients Carlsberg could become the biggest owner: "This can open the door for Carlsberg to increase its stake."

"We do not comment on concrete cases before we have made a decision," Carlsberg spokesman Jens Bekke said.

"But it is still valid that we continue to want to build a platform in Asia for future growth, as we have done up to now," Bekke said.

Carlsberg sees Asia as a long-term growth market.

Chief Executive Jorgen Buhl Rasmussen told Danish daily Jyllands-Posten in October 2009: "We see Chongqing as an extremely interesting opportunity for us."

"And the more we get into the business, the more we see it as an opportunity to include in ...More Info

Japan’s domestic shipments of beer and beerlike alcoholic drinks in the first three months of the year dropped 5.7 percent from a year earlier, hitting a record low for the quarter, Kyodo News posted on April, 13.

Shipments of beer, low-malt happoshu beer and so-called third-category beerlike alcoholic drinks fell to 86.13 million cases due to the economic downturn and also because consumption of alcoholic beverages continued to decline among younger people, Japan’s top five brewers said.

The previous record low was marked five years ago.

Kirin Brewery Co. came out on top in the quarter with a market share of 37.3 percent, followed by Asahi Breweries Ltd. with a 35.5 percent share.

Kirin saw shipments decline 6.6 percent and Asahi's were off 6.5 percent, both from the year before, but Kirin moved ahead because it did well in third-category alcoholic drinks.

Shipments of Kirin's popular product in this category, Nodogoshi Nama, jumped 5.7 percent.

Suntory Liquors Ltd., which came in third in the market rankings, saw its market share rise to 14.2 percent, the highest since it began compiling comparable statistics in 1992, as shipments of its third-category beer Kinmugi surged 37.3 percent.

Sapporo Breweries Ltd. ranked fourth with a market share of 12.0 percent, followed ...More Info

Constellation Brands said on April, 9 its fiscal 2010 equity earnings from its 50 percent interest in the Crown Imports joint venture totalled $222 million, a decrease of 12 percent from the prior year.

For fiscal 2010, Crown Imports, Constellation’s joint beer venture with Mexican brewer Grupo Modelo, generated net sales of $2.3 billion, a decrease of six percent, and operating income of $444 million, a decrease of 12 percent.

Net sales for Crown were impacted primarily by volume declines. Operating income for Crown decreased primarily due to lower volumes, negative mix and a contractual cost increase, Constellation Brands said.

SABMiller is likely to benefit from falling commodity prices in its financial year ending March next year, rating agency Moody’s was quoted as saying by Business Day on April, 14.

The world’s second-largest brewer, which hedged the prices of many of its raw materials at the top of the commodity cycle, had been unable to benefit as these had fallen, but as they unwound it would do so, said Moody’s analyst Yasmina Serghini-Douvin.

The effect of hedging costs hit local unit SAB hard, and cost the company 300 basis points of gross margin by some calculations. SAB made its contracts at a time of high prices and a weak rand — a point MD Norman Adami rued last year. “We happened to hit it at the peak of both of them.”

While this may be good news, Moody’s warned that some raw- material costs, particularly packaging and sugar, were rising.

SABMiller concurred. “Whilst brewing raw material costs have indeed declined … some other input costs such as energy, which feed through into packaging costs and distribution costs, have risen with the oil price,” spokesman Nigel Fairbrass said.

Carlsberg Brewery Malaysia Bhd’s board of directors recommended a final gross dividend of 7.5 sen per ordinary share of RM0.50 sen each as well as a special gross dividend of 10.5 sen per ordinary share of RM0.50 each, The Borneo Post communicated on April, 10.

The company has announced the distribution of 69 per cent from its profit as part of its commitment to shareholders.

Additionally, it noted that together with the interim gross dividend of 5.0 sen per ordinary share of RM0.50 each, the total gross dividend for last year was 23 sen per ordinary share of RM0.50 sen each. In comparison, it posted total gross dividend of 12.5 sen per ordinary share of RM0.50 each in 2008.

“The acquisition of Carlsberg Singapore Pte Ltd (Carlsberg Singapore) was successfully completed in 2009. This strategic development will enable the group to expand into a profitable and growing neighbouring market while simultaneously generating significant operational synergies,” chairman Datuk Lim Say Chong stated in a recent statement.

Nevertheless, Lim revealed that it was not an easy time for the brewery last year, operating amidst difficult conditions.

“The group’s operating environment in 2009 was challenging, with the impact of the global financial crisis of 2008 flowed into ...More Info

In its latest report, the IGC has reduced its estimate of world malt trade in 2009/10 by 300,000 tons to 5.4 mln tons (all IGC figures are in grain equivalent).

The greatest reduction is seen for the EU from 2.2 to 2.0 mln tons, while most other exporters will experience minor or no changes (all figures in 1000 tons): Argentina 500; Australia 700; Canada 765; USA 530; China 375; Uruguay 380; others 150.

EU exports have fallen from 2.735 to 2.0 mln tons since 2006/07, from 47 to 37% of world trade. However, part of the former exports has become EU intra-trade with the enlargement of the Union, IGC said.

NAFTA in-trade is still registered as international trade; the U.S. imports of 420,000 tons from Canada and exports of 530,000 tons to Canada and Mexico are in reality transfers inside the same companies.

The largest malt importers of this campaign will be Brazil, 1 mln tons, and Japan, 650,000 tons. Southeast Asian countries import 750,000 tons, IGC experts forecast.

The Malt Company (India) Pvt. Ltd. announced on April, 9 it has successfully commissioned its third malthouse in Uttarakhand.

The facility’s 75 thousand tonnes malting capacity may be doubled should the need arise, the company said.

The Malt Company (India) Pvt. Ltd. is one of the oldest players on India’s malt market and supplies its production to the nation’s two largest brewers, United Breweries and SABMiller.

The two largest Indian beer makers cover nearly fifty per cent of their malt needs at the Malt Company, it claims.

The addition of the newest state-of-the art malt plant will raise the company’s total production capacity to 135 thousand tonnes of malt per year.

NYSE Liffe, the Europe-based derivatives business of NYSE Euronext, announced on April, 13 the launch of malting barley futures and options on Monday 10 May 2010.

The NYSE Liffe Malting Barley Contract, which will encompass Malting Barley from any European origin in a 50-tonne lot size, has been designed to meet the growing demand for new price risk management tools from the European Malting Barley sector. It is unique in being the only market available worldwide to meet the specific hedging requirements of maltsters, brewers and distillers as well as those engaged in the production and trade of malting barley.

Ian Dudden, Director of Commodity Derivatives at NYSE Liffe commented: “We have seen unprecedented growth in our portfolio of agricultural futures and options contracts over recent years. Going forward, we expect Malting Barley to play an important part in the continued growth of this portfolio as demand for price risk management tools continues to increase across the European agricultural sector.”

François Pignolet, Deputy CEO of Axereal, a leading player in the European grain sector added “The Malting Barley sector has been in need of an organised market tool for many years: it is essential for the organisation of the industry, from producer to ...More Info

Barley Australia, the industry body for Australia’s maltsters and barley marketers, issued on April, 12 an update to its Preferred Variety List of malting barley varieties.

Barley Australia said it had decided to conduct more regular reviews of the list throughout the year rather than annually as was previously the case.

The list below ranks those varieties which are most sought after by purchasers of Australian malting barley who are members of Barley Australia according to their current demand on both the export and domestic markets. The list also ranks this demand on a state by state basis.

Mr David Thomas, the Chairman of Barley Australia, said that the objective of updating the list more regularly is to ensure that growers are provided with the most up to date information on the varieties most in demand by Australia’s major barley buyers. “Whilst these varieties should command the best prices, this will not always be the case due to variations in supply between major growing areas of Australia as a result of varying seasonal conditions,” Mr Thomas said.

“It is also important to remember that an emerging popularity of a new variety, changing preferences by our customers, the world supply and demand ...More Info

At the beginning of April, Brazil purchased 25,000 tonnes of French malting barley and was expected to tender for one more cargo, industry sources report.

The South American import program is around 300,000 tons from Canada and the EU, and will go up, experts said.

The Argentinean barley crop was a failure after all, taking quantity and quality together. Brazil and the Pacific coast countries must cover a good part of their demand from outside their continent.

Chile reports a good crop of more than 100,000 tons of malting barley.

Garry Menz, Christian Andrighetto, Angiolella Lombardi, Viviana Corich, Peter Aldred and Frank Vriesekoop

J. Inst. Brew. 116(1), 14–22, 2010 ABSTRACT
Lactic acid bacteria are the most frequently encountered beerspoilage bacteria, and they may render beer undrinkable due to the production of lactic acid, diacetyl, and turbidity. Microbrewed beer is typically sold unpasteurised, leaving it more susceptible to spoilage by lactic acid bacteria. In this study, the incidence of lactic acid bacteria in bottled microbrewed beer from Victoria, Australia was investigated. A total of 80 beers from 19 breweries were screened for lactic acid bacteria. Almost 30% contained culturable lactic acid bacteria, and many had lactic acid levels well above the flavour threshold. Ethanol, hops, and the pH levels of the beers were not predictors for spoilage in the beers examined, and contamination appeared to be more closely linked to the source brewery. The 45 lactic acid strains isolated from these beers were identified by RAPD-PCR, with Lactobacillus brevis being the most frequently isolated species. All isolates were capable of spoiling beer and contained putative hop resistance genes. At typical beer levels, pH and ethanol had no effect on the growth of the particular spoilage bacteria isolated in this study. Load full article, 9 pages, 1353kb , PDF file