I'm reporting live from the beautiful Hotel Volga in downtown Bucharest, Romania, where the mystery meat in gray sauce was featured at the recent Plenum of the Workers' Party 18th Conference ... no, wait; my mistake. Actually I'm at the Executive Inn in Evansville, Indiana, for my family (mom's side) reunion.
It's got me rapping:
One NABC growler down
With Lite beer all around
They say my grandaddy drank Miller
But this Publican ain't no swiller
BUT SERIOUSLY ... I've nothing whatsoever against the city of Evansville, and my regrets are two-fold. First, I'm only here for one night, which means that the only chance to see my relatives precludes visiting Turoni's for excellent pizza and craft beer. Second, in order to make it to Indianapolis tomorrow in time for the beer dinner at Opti Park, I may have to miss the opportunity to savor barbecued mutton at the family's picnic near Henderson Friday afternoon.
Not to mention the brain sandwiches that are an Evansville staple.
There'll be time in the future. For now, my Friday plan is to hit the road after breakfast, head north to Terre Haute, then pick up I-70 into the state capital. I'll have four growlers in the trunk, a bag of homemade (by the Mrs.) trail mix in the front seat, some hoary Elvin Bishop cassette tapes to play while driving my mom's 12-year-old Crown Vic, and a wonderful goal: Great Indiana food, great Indiana-brewed beer, great company and a weekend that proves how damned lucky I am to be in such a great business.
I get paid to drink beer. Who'd have thunk it?
Showing posts with label brewing industry. Show all posts
Showing posts with label brewing industry. Show all posts
Thursday, July 17, 2008
Tuesday, September 18, 2007
"US barley acreage has declined to record low levels."
The information that follows has been copied from the Brewers Association Forum Vol. 13-0912, and should be of interest to all readers.
Yesterday we took a glance at sobering news for the hopheads among us.
Today I’m posting a second excerpt from the Forum, this one on the topic of barley malt pricing and availability.
As noted yesterday, none of this is designed to inspire panic or perpetuate doomsday scenarios. Rather, it's useful to nurse the occasional dose of realism about where the beer in the glass comes from, and what it takes to make it.
Chase it with a good beer, and keep your fingers crossed. The planet’s reliance on water is well documented, but so far, I can find no alarming prognostications about yeast shortages.
----
From: Mike Davis
Sent: Tuesday, September 11, 2007 - 4:26 PM
Subject: Re: 2007: Revenge of the Commodities
Paul Gatza called me recently and I reviewed the many factors that are impacting the supply of malting barley. The world markets are interconnected, so what happens in any major supply area, such as the US, impacts the entire chain. The American Malting Barley Association (AMBA), which is comprised of US malting & brewing companies, works with and knows the US situation, so I will primarily comment on that.
US barley acreage has declined to record low levels, and one reason, as pointed out by Jeremy, is likely the high demand/return for corn for ethanol, which encourages growers to plant corn instead of malting barley. With the barley breeding programs in the US that we collaborate with and support, we stress the need to develop the highest yielding malting varieties so that they will be grown for both feed, fuel, and malting. However, it is difficult to combine all the quality characters our industry demands with high yield, and our industry is slow to change over to new, higher yielding varieties.
Developing high yielding varieties for feed/fuel is easier and quicker and this is the competition we must strive to overcome.
Currently, all malting varieties in the US are spring varieties, but we have winter malting lines in development and testing that can out yield spring varieties up to 25 percent and require one less watering, a big advantage in the West where water is scarce. These winter malting barley varieties, if successful, may be able to pick up acreage that is currently planted to winter wheat in the West.
Another major factor is that federal support to growers, as determined by the Farm Bill, has favored the planting of other crops, such as soybeans, over barley, by providing higher support levels to growers. We are working hard in collaboration with the National Barley Growers Association (NBGA) for more favorable provisions in the 2007 Farm Bill, which will be effective for five years, starting with the 2008 crop. We are pleased that the BA signed on to the joint letter to Congress spearheaded by the Beer Institute, at our urging, encouraging Congress to support the joint AMBA/NBGA Farm Bill positions. The House has passed a version of the Farm Bill that is more favorable to barley and we're now working on the Senate.
Once that is passed, we'll need grass roots support (contacting your members of Congress) to help ensure that the most favorable provisions are retained in House/Senate Conference when the final bill is developed.
Working with the Institute of Barley and Malt Sciences at North Dakota State University, growers in the 3 major US barley producing states were surveyed recently as to why they grow or no longer grow malting barley. Of course, economic return is the most important factor - they will plant crops that give them the highest return, and we must face reality, that there is a lot of competition. Other factors come into play, and we are trying to address those (e.g. developing best management practices to growers to increase their chances of success).
Mike Davis, President
American Malting Barley Association, Inc.
www.AMBAinc.org
Yesterday we took a glance at sobering news for the hopheads among us.
Today I’m posting a second excerpt from the Forum, this one on the topic of barley malt pricing and availability.
As noted yesterday, none of this is designed to inspire panic or perpetuate doomsday scenarios. Rather, it's useful to nurse the occasional dose of realism about where the beer in the glass comes from, and what it takes to make it.
Chase it with a good beer, and keep your fingers crossed. The planet’s reliance on water is well documented, but so far, I can find no alarming prognostications about yeast shortages.
----
From: Mike Davis
Sent: Tuesday, September 11, 2007 - 4:26 PM
Subject: Re: 2007: Revenge of the Commodities
Paul Gatza called me recently and I reviewed the many factors that are impacting the supply of malting barley. The world markets are interconnected, so what happens in any major supply area, such as the US, impacts the entire chain. The American Malting Barley Association (AMBA), which is comprised of US malting & brewing companies, works with and knows the US situation, so I will primarily comment on that.
US barley acreage has declined to record low levels, and one reason, as pointed out by Jeremy, is likely the high demand/return for corn for ethanol, which encourages growers to plant corn instead of malting barley. With the barley breeding programs in the US that we collaborate with and support, we stress the need to develop the highest yielding malting varieties so that they will be grown for both feed, fuel, and malting. However, it is difficult to combine all the quality characters our industry demands with high yield, and our industry is slow to change over to new, higher yielding varieties.
Developing high yielding varieties for feed/fuel is easier and quicker and this is the competition we must strive to overcome.
Currently, all malting varieties in the US are spring varieties, but we have winter malting lines in development and testing that can out yield spring varieties up to 25 percent and require one less watering, a big advantage in the West where water is scarce. These winter malting barley varieties, if successful, may be able to pick up acreage that is currently planted to winter wheat in the West.
Another major factor is that federal support to growers, as determined by the Farm Bill, has favored the planting of other crops, such as soybeans, over barley, by providing higher support levels to growers. We are working hard in collaboration with the National Barley Growers Association (NBGA) for more favorable provisions in the 2007 Farm Bill, which will be effective for five years, starting with the 2008 crop. We are pleased that the BA signed on to the joint letter to Congress spearheaded by the Beer Institute, at our urging, encouraging Congress to support the joint AMBA/NBGA Farm Bill positions. The House has passed a version of the Farm Bill that is more favorable to barley and we're now working on the Senate.
Once that is passed, we'll need grass roots support (contacting your members of Congress) to help ensure that the most favorable provisions are retained in House/Senate Conference when the final bill is developed.
Working with the Institute of Barley and Malt Sciences at North Dakota State University, growers in the 3 major US barley producing states were surveyed recently as to why they grow or no longer grow malting barley. Of course, economic return is the most important factor - they will plant crops that give them the highest return, and we must face reality, that there is a lot of competition. Other factors come into play, and we are trying to address those (e.g. developing best management practices to growers to increase their chances of success).
Mike Davis, President
American Malting Barley Association, Inc.
www.AMBAinc.org
Monday, September 17, 2007
"The hop world is upside down. In the future we see the possibility of brewers shutting down for lack of hops."
The information that follows has been copied from the Brewers Association Forum Vol. 13-0911, and should be of interest to all readers, but especially the hopheads among us.
Tomorrow I’ll post another excerpt from the Forum, this one on the topic of barley malt pricing and availability.
Need I remind anyone about rising fuel prices?
None of this is designed to inspire panic or perpetuate doomsday scenarios. There are plenty of those to be found on the front page of today's newspaper. Rather, it's useful to nurse the occasional dose of realism about where the beer in the glass comes from, and what it takes to make it.
Chase it with a good beer, and keep your fingers crossed.
----
From: David Edgar
Sent: Tuesday, September 11, 2007 - 3:12 PM
Subject: Re: Dramatic Price Increases in Ingredients
Hop Supply and Early 2007 Crop Update
Here are some comments from Ralph Olson's talk two weeks ago during Hopunion's annual Hops & Brew School seminars in Yakima (also used as the basis for a Hop Update presentation I gave last Saturday to the MBAA District New England in Portland, ME). Ralph is very busy at the moment between receiving hops, buying hops and quoting different brewers for contracts, so he asked me to send this post.
"The hop world is upside down. In the future we see the possibility of brewers shutting down for lack of hops."
For US hops 2007 is looking like an average crop, but not a bumper crop.
Slovenia (grower of Styrians) lost at least 1/3 and possibly as much as 1/2 of their crop to a hailstorm.
The Czech crop is down 25% this year. Estimated alphas on Czech Saaz from the 2007 crop are 2.7 - 2.9.
The German crop is average at best with earlier aroma hops coming in below normal (such as Hallertau Mittelfruh).
New Zealand and Australia crops this year (which arrived in the US in June and July) were normal.
England is almost out of the hop business. Their acreage of 2,400 in 2006 (down from 17,000 in 1976) represents 2 percent of the worldwide acreage.
World acreage:
1986: 215,600
1992: 236,000
2006: 123,000
Ralph's best guess is that in 1992 the acreage should have been between 160,000 - 170,000 if it was to match world demand/usage at that time. The 1990s' excess hop crop ended up being processed into pellets and extracts, building up substantial excess inventory. Excess production that was 2, 3 and 5 years old was selling on the open market and as a result brought prices down. Hop prices had dropped so low in recent years that in many cases they were lower than what it costs to grow them. For example: prices got as low as $1.70/lb. for pellets of Cascade.
That is way below what it takes for a hop grower to cover his costs.
High-alpha hops and some aroma hops are going overseas - the high rate of the Euro is a factor.
In the spot market for high-alpha hops, growers are not putting a price on them yet. They're waiting to see how high the prices may go.
In the late 1990s and early 2000s the prices were depressed and growers were starting to throw in the towel, to either switch to other crops, or sell out to real estate developers. The ones who stayed in it and managed to survive without going under are pleased to be in this situation now, which is 180 degrees opposite from where it was about 10 years ago.
The demand for Cascades is up 30% this year alone. We are 300-400 acres short on Cascade compared to where we need to be. Cascade acreage was 1,003 in 2001, jumped up to 2,120 in 2003 (because one major brewer announced plans to use it, but then reversed course) and total Cascade acreage is now back near the same 2001-year-level, at 1,116 in 2006.
Prices are the highest they've ever been - and it's beyond comprehension. Cascades were priced at $7/lb. three weeks ago and are currently being quoted at or near $10.00/lb.
Willamettes went from $5.50 to $7.00/lb. and may also get to $10/lb.
It takes three years to get to full production on a new hop field, however, we don't have the number of growers needed to put new acres in (the total of US growers is about 45, down from more than 2000 in 1978. About new 2,000 acres are going in this year; almost all of those are high alpha. The Cascade increase in acreage is 0.
"We are, in my opinion, in trouble."
What's the bottom line? Certain varieties are getting a lot more expensive. A few varieties will run out faster than ever. Brewers have to be willing to try other varieties. Brewmasters, brewery owners, and marketing and sales managers must prepare for the potential need to substitute different hops, to replace varieties that currently give your beers their "signature" flavor. That's what we'll have to get used to, the fact that there may be slight flavor variations over the next several years, as the hop industry works to correct this situation. It's not going to get better soon, but will be likely just as bad, or worse, for the crops from 2008 and 2009, in other words, for beers brewed from now through 2010.
Wish we had better news to report!
David Edgar
Mountain West Brewery Supply, Inc., representing:
* Chrisdec www.chrisdec.com & Rastal www.rastal.com
* Hopunion www.hopunion.com
* White Labs www.whitelabs.com
* Chrislan Ceramics www.chrislanceramics.com
Tomorrow I’ll post another excerpt from the Forum, this one on the topic of barley malt pricing and availability.
Need I remind anyone about rising fuel prices?
None of this is designed to inspire panic or perpetuate doomsday scenarios. There are plenty of those to be found on the front page of today's newspaper. Rather, it's useful to nurse the occasional dose of realism about where the beer in the glass comes from, and what it takes to make it.
Chase it with a good beer, and keep your fingers crossed.
----
From: David Edgar
Sent: Tuesday, September 11, 2007 - 3:12 PM
Subject: Re: Dramatic Price Increases in Ingredients
Hop Supply and Early 2007 Crop Update
Here are some comments from Ralph Olson's talk two weeks ago during Hopunion's annual Hops & Brew School seminars in Yakima (also used as the basis for a Hop Update presentation I gave last Saturday to the MBAA District New England in Portland, ME). Ralph is very busy at the moment between receiving hops, buying hops and quoting different brewers for contracts, so he asked me to send this post.
"The hop world is upside down. In the future we see the possibility of brewers shutting down for lack of hops."
For US hops 2007 is looking like an average crop, but not a bumper crop.
Slovenia (grower of Styrians) lost at least 1/3 and possibly as much as 1/2 of their crop to a hailstorm.
The Czech crop is down 25% this year. Estimated alphas on Czech Saaz from the 2007 crop are 2.7 - 2.9.
The German crop is average at best with earlier aroma hops coming in below normal (such as Hallertau Mittelfruh).
New Zealand and Australia crops this year (which arrived in the US in June and July) were normal.
England is almost out of the hop business. Their acreage of 2,400 in 2006 (down from 17,000 in 1976) represents 2 percent of the worldwide acreage.
World acreage:
1986: 215,600
1992: 236,000
2006: 123,000
Ralph's best guess is that in 1992 the acreage should have been between 160,000 - 170,000 if it was to match world demand/usage at that time. The 1990s' excess hop crop ended up being processed into pellets and extracts, building up substantial excess inventory. Excess production that was 2, 3 and 5 years old was selling on the open market and as a result brought prices down. Hop prices had dropped so low in recent years that in many cases they were lower than what it costs to grow them. For example: prices got as low as $1.70/lb. for pellets of Cascade.
That is way below what it takes for a hop grower to cover his costs.
High-alpha hops and some aroma hops are going overseas - the high rate of the Euro is a factor.
In the spot market for high-alpha hops, growers are not putting a price on them yet. They're waiting to see how high the prices may go.
In the late 1990s and early 2000s the prices were depressed and growers were starting to throw in the towel, to either switch to other crops, or sell out to real estate developers. The ones who stayed in it and managed to survive without going under are pleased to be in this situation now, which is 180 degrees opposite from where it was about 10 years ago.
The demand for Cascades is up 30% this year alone. We are 300-400 acres short on Cascade compared to where we need to be. Cascade acreage was 1,003 in 2001, jumped up to 2,120 in 2003 (because one major brewer announced plans to use it, but then reversed course) and total Cascade acreage is now back near the same 2001-year-level, at 1,116 in 2006.
Prices are the highest they've ever been - and it's beyond comprehension. Cascades were priced at $7/lb. three weeks ago and are currently being quoted at or near $10.00/lb.
Willamettes went from $5.50 to $7.00/lb. and may also get to $10/lb.
It takes three years to get to full production on a new hop field, however, we don't have the number of growers needed to put new acres in (the total of US growers is about 45, down from more than 2000 in 1978. About new 2,000 acres are going in this year; almost all of those are high alpha. The Cascade increase in acreage is 0.
"We are, in my opinion, in trouble."
What's the bottom line? Certain varieties are getting a lot more expensive. A few varieties will run out faster than ever. Brewers have to be willing to try other varieties. Brewmasters, brewery owners, and marketing and sales managers must prepare for the potential need to substitute different hops, to replace varieties that currently give your beers their "signature" flavor. That's what we'll have to get used to, the fact that there may be slight flavor variations over the next several years, as the hop industry works to correct this situation. It's not going to get better soon, but will be likely just as bad, or worse, for the crops from 2008 and 2009, in other words, for beers brewed from now through 2010.
Wish we had better news to report!
David Edgar
Mountain West Brewery Supply, Inc., representing:
* Chrisdec www.chrisdec.com & Rastal www.rastal.com
* Hopunion www.hopunion.com
* White Labs www.whitelabs.com
* Chrislan Ceramics www.chrislanceramics.com
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