Drought could push up the price of a half of beer
The "minicanicule" announced for the next 48 hours will probably only reinforce the trend: "With the good weather that prevailed in France, beer consumption has registered an increase of 2.7% over the first months of year, "said Pascal Chevremont, managing director of France Brewers, whose 76 members account for three quarters of the beer produced in France. The increase is mixed following market segments: + 0.6% for cafés, hotels, restaurants and up 3.7% in supermarkets.
The warm spring and very dry, however, is not very good news for the sector. He has had a devastating effect on crops of malting barley."With the rain in recent days, there may be good surprises, but overall we expect yields down 55 quintals per hectare or so, a decrease of 10 to 20% compared to Last year, "Christophe fears Grison, president of the network Farre (Forum of farming environmentally friendly), himself a farmer of malting barley in the Oise.
Especially since the quality risk, too, to be less. "The water did not fall at the right time, we expect to see the analysis made after the harvest on the eating quality and protein content of barley, says Pascal Chevremont. Decommissioning of feed barley malting barley should be more important. "
Christmas Beer
The offer should be hexagonal in decline. Yet France is the second largest exporter of barley after Russia cash advances pay day loan.The price of this raw material, essential to the manufacture of beer, will therefore remain at high levels. According to the latest monthly bulletin of economic FranceAgriMer (the body responsible for collecting data on agricultural crops in France), prices have more than doubled in one year, more than 235 euros a tonne. They even reached in early May 320 euros per tonne on the futures market Euronext.
For the moment, "the brewers are working on stocks three months ago," said Michel Portier for his part, Director of Agritel, a company specializing in risk management in the prices of agricultural commodities. So no risk of immediate price increase of the half at the counter.
The first harvest of barley into malt today – it takes between 150 and 200 grams of malt to make a liter of beer – will not be in the glasses before the end of the year, with Christmas beer.
"But ultimately, it will have an impact on the final product increased barley as packaging, another important component of cost, also recorded significant increases," warned Pascal Chevremont. Tariff negotiations ahead sandwiched between the purchasing of large retailers – which sells three-quarters of the beer – and the four major brewers, who control more than half the world market: AB InBev (Leffe), SAB Miller, Heineken and Carlsberg (Kronenbourg).