China: Beer output will continue to grow at a rate of around 5% during the 11th five-year period

China's beer output will keep growing at a rate of around 5% during the 11th Five-year period despite the large cardinal number, according to IPD Group press release, April 18. And due to the adjustment of the product structure, the development of the rural market as well as the gradually orderly market competition, the beer price will rise and so will the profit-making ability.

Since its reform and opening up, China's beer industry has been developing rapidly. In 2005, the beer output had broken the record of 30 million liters to 30.61 million liters for the first time, rising 5.2% year-on-year, and the output and sales volume has ranked first for four successive years. According to the latest data of the National Statistics Bureau of China, in Jan-early Sep 2006, the beer output across China reached 28.4 million tons, increasing by 13.0% over the same period of 2005.

Currently, the per capita beer consumption in China has been near to 22 liters, but it is only about 10 liters in the central and western regions, and it is less than 5 liters in the rural areas with over 800 million populations. However, the present average level in the world is 30 liters, and more than 80 liters in the Occident countries. Moreover, the per capita beer consumption in the Czech Republic, Ireland and Germany has exceeded 159 liters, 135 liters and 117 liters respectively while that in China is merely 1/8 of the Czech Republic's, 1/4 of America's and 40% of Japan's. If the per capita beer consumption in China reaches the international level (30 liters), the production scale would surge to 40 million tons with over RMB 100 billion sales revenue.

As China becomes the largest beer production country and the most important consumer market in the world, the foreign capitals have started enlarging investment in Chinese market. The campaign of the world's three giants in China has aroused the wide attention in the field. Chinese beer enterprises will enter an international competition era in national market, which will focus on brand, strategy and capital instead of product, quality and service.

The biggest Companies:

-Qingdao Beer Group

-Beijing Yanjing Beer Group Corporation

-Huarun Beer Group

-Guangdong Zhujiang Beer Group

-Shenzhen Kingway Brewery Co Ltd

-Fujian Yanjing Huiquan Brewery Co., Ltd

-Chongqing Brewery Co., Ltd

-Budweiser Wuhan International Brewing Company Ltd

E-malt.com, the global information source for the brewing and malting industry professionals. The bi-weekly E-malt.com Newsletters feature latest industry news, statistics in graphs and tables, world barley and malt prices, and other relevant information. Click here to get full access to E-malt.com. If you are a Castle Malting client, you can get free access to E-malt.com website and publications. Contact us for more information at marketing@castlemalting.com .