The association expects a revival in consumption with the adoption of the new Tax Code which sets lower excises duties.
According to the association, the market decline was caused by a 16% increase in excise duty on beer in 2013 and the changes brought last year to the currency exchange rate used to calculate it, which triggered an excise duty higher by 5 percentage points.
In 2013, the local beer market shrank over 10%.
A Romanian drank, on average, 74 liters of beer in 2014, compared to 81 liters a year ago and a record high of 99 liters in 2008.
The contraction of the Romanian beer market in 2014 caused brewers’ invested budgets, which totaled EUR60 million, to shrink by EUR2 million.
Last year, nearly 53.1% (a year-on-year decrease 0.1 percentage points) of Romanians preferred PET-packed beer, the consumption of bottled beer fell by 0.5 percentage points to 25.8%, while consumers of beer cans accounted for 17.6% of the market, up by 0.5 percentage points compared to 2013.