COV E R F E AT U R E
China’s thirst for beer is well known throughout the brewing
world. It’s estimated that Chinese beer drinkers will consume
some 38.3 billion litres in 2019, making it the largest
market for beer in the world – dwarfing markets like the U.S. and
Germany when it comes to the consumption of cold ones.
While the volume of beer China consumes is expected to
remain relatively static, the beer market in that country is currently
undergoing a substantive transformation. Thanks in large part to
rising disposable incomes and a growing young consumer base,
there is an increasing thirst for premium ales and lagers among
Chinese beer drinkers.
China’s shift towards premium and foreign brews has been
good news for Canada. In fact, it has contributed to a significant
increase of Canadian exports to that country of malting barley, one
of the main ingredients in beer production. In 2013-14, Canadian
exports of malt barley to China stood at about 460,000 tons. In
2017-18, that number rose to 1.2 million tons, nearly triple the total
from just four years earlier.
Direct Impact on Canada
“There’s been a direct impact on Canada because the companies
that are making craft beer or premium beer tend to rely on better
quality malting barley,” said Peter Watts, managing director of
the Winnipeg-based Canadian Malting Barley Technical Centre
(CMBTC). “Canada’s one of the top suppliers of premium malting
barley in the world…and we have seen very substantial growth just
in the last three or four years for malting barley from China.”
Watts says that while 2017-18 might have been a bit of
an anomaly, Canada is still projected to export somewhere in
SUMMER 2019 § POURED CANADA § 5