Last year, the national beer companies produced nearly 3.8 billion liters of beer, accounting for 85.6 percent of the set plan.
Habeco, Hue Brewery under Carlsberg and Sabeco hold huge market shares in Vietnam while Heineken is leading the premium segment. Among major beer producers nationwide, southern Saigon Beer Alcohol Beverage Corporation (Sabeco) remained the biggest one, with output of over 1.6 billion liters of all kinds of beer in 2016. According to Canadean Group, the market research and analysis provider to the beverage industry, in 2015, average beer consumption reached 41 litres per person, behind South Korea and Japan. However, Vietnam's beer industry growth in the past five years has been high at 5.7%.
Beer is favoured by many Vietnamese people. Beer accounts for 94% of total alcoholic consumption and the market will continue to growth at the annual rate of 4-5% thanks to young population and rising personal incomes.
Vietnam is among the 25 countries with the highest rates of increase in alcohol and beer consumption in the world. It has 129 brewing facilities mostly in big cities like Hanoi, Hue and Ho Chi Minh City. In addition, Vietnam also imports 3 million litres and exports over 70 million litres of beer each year.
Earlier in September 2016, Vietnams Ministry of Industry and Trade issued a planning on development of the countrys beer, alcohol, beverage industry till 2025 with vision to 2035.
Under the planning, by 2025, Vietnam will produce some 4.6 billion liters of beer, 350 million liters of alcohol (40 percent of which is industrially produced), and 9.1 billion liters of beverage. The sector is set to bring export revenue of 600 million U.S. dollars.