Excessive rainfall during harvesting badly damaged grain
crops (especially malting barley) in Scandinavia and
Germany. The total production of EU malting barley fell
from 12.60 million tonnes in 2009/10 to 10.30 million
tonnes in 2010/2011. The immediate effect was that
between the month of June 2010 and the end of the year
the value of EU malting barley in France, for example,
almost doubled going from 150€ per tonne to 230€ per
tonne. In 2011 the industry has also been confronted
with the effect of the poor 2010 harvest in the Ukraine
and Russia where a severe spring/summer drought cut
grain production, smaller barley crops meant that a large
percentage of European malting barley was actually
purchased by feed barley consumers.
The 2011/12 will also be a diffcult season. A very severe
spring drought coupled with a heat wave damaged
grain crops in France, Germany and the U.K. in all these
countries the total production of malting barley will be
affected. Luckily the weather has been much more
favorable in central Europe and Scandinavia.
Malt production in Europe
The actual EU malt production capacity is 9,60 million
tonnes, which is the largest in the world. Malt is produced
in maltings. Although many breweries buy their malt on
the market, some breweries have their own malting plant.
In our questionnaire at least nine breweries indicated that
they owned at least one maltings. Our questionnaire
24
gathered information from 22 breweries in 14 different
countries on where they purchase their malt if they do
not have their own maltings. Five breweries indicated that
they purchase (part of) their malt in Germany, fve in the
Netherlands, fve in France and four in Poland.
Year
2008/2009 2009/2010 2010/2011 2011/2012*
E.U.(as 27)
65,47
61,98
53,14
54, 61
Number of maltings in Europe (2010)
Germany
56
Czech Republic
34
United Kingdom
29
France
15
Spain
6
Poland
6
Slovakia
6
Belgium / Luxembourg
5
Bulgaria
4
Other
28
Total (EU27)
186
Total (EU27 and Turkey and Croatia)
189
›
Source : Euromalt.
* Estimation
›
Source : Euromalt.
›
Table 6.2./ Barley production in previous years
›
Table 6.3. / Number of maltings in Europe
24
Questionnaire breweries, Ernst and Young, 2011
25
Countries with 3 maltings are Denmark, Netherlands, Lithuania.
Countries with two maltings are : Finland, Ireland, Italy, Austria, Greece, Portugal, Hungary, Turkey. Countries with one malting : Sweden, Romania and Croatia.
26
Presentation Euromalt (Feb. 2011). Malteurs de France 2008 export fgures ; malt estimated at 350 €/t
The number of maltings in Europe is presented in the
table below (table 6.3). Germany, Czech Republic, United
Kingdom and France have the largest number of maltings
in their country
25
.
The European Union is also the leading worldwide malt
exporter, representing approximately forty percent of the
World malt trade. The EU malt exports stands for a 735
million euro foreign earnings equivalent
26
.
The Contribution made by Beer to the European Economy
44