Beer production in Australia

I didn't find it fair to talk about Marijuana in Australia without pointing out Australia's "Beer Culture". So I did something I've wanted to do personally for awhile now, determine exactly how much beer is produced in Australia. So I turned to Wikipedia...

The 'Breweries in Australia' Wikipedia article divides breweries into 3 categories.'Major Breweries', 'Microbreweries' and 'Brewpubs'.

'Major Breweries' currently consists of 9 breweries consisting of nationally recognizable beer brands.

'Microbreweries' are distinguished by adding that "The maximum amount of beer a brewery can produce and still be classed as a microbrewery varies by region and by authority, though is usually around 15,000 barrels (18,000 hectolitres/ 475,000 US gallons) a year."

There are a total of 114 Microbreweries listed in the article. I did note that one microbrewery was closed, so I am unsure how many are still active in the complete list (sorry, no. I won't be crecking them all individually :P)

Brewpubs; restaurants or pubs that have breweries attached to them...34 of them make the Wikipedia list.

157 recognised breweries in total...now for some figures.


Carlton & United Breweries

Producers of Victoria Bitter (VB), Carlton Draught, Melbourne Bitter, Carlton Cold, Carlton Midstrength, Carlton Black, Crown Lager...although I could only produce figures for how much Victoria Bitter (VB) that they produce.

"VB is Australia's only billion dollar retail beer brand and sells the equivalent of one slab (24x375ml cans/bottles (9 Litres) every second"  

9L X 60secs X 60mins X 24hrs X 365days = 283,824,000 Litres per year
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victoria_Bitter)

Cascade Brewery

36 million litres (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cascade_Brewery)

Coopers Brewery


"Production during 2010-11 reached a record 62.9 million litres"
http://www.coopers.com.au/about-us/news - "Coopers continues Record Production" 21/12/2011

Boag's Brewery


J. Boag and Son currently (2010) employes over 150 people and produces over 76,000,000 litres of beer annually.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._Boag_%26_Sons

Tooheys Brewery


Production output: 300 million litres
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tooheys - Citation provided

Providing these figures are true, between these 4 breweries and the most successful beer of just one other major brewery, a total of 758,724,000 litres are brewed! If Australia's population were to be 23 million (it's less) there would be enough beer produced to give everyone over 32 litres.

Thanks for reading :) To wrap things up here's a picture that illustrates what Australian's today think of our collective alcohol consumption...

Australian Police Officer Bashes Victim Caught on Video

Hi everyone,

I've been coming up with blanks for content lately so sorry but there's not too much I can do about that - I'd change it if I could but it's outside my control really.

Anyhow a news story I saw today compelled me to right.

A video has been released of a uniformed New South Wales Police Officer punching an allegedly drunk spectator who (again allegedly) didn't follow orders when asked to leave...an embedded YouTube video (Bite me SOPA ?) is below, and below that is some more of my insight on the matter.

Also, the reason I said "allegedly" some many times was because news reports say the police officer 'allegedly' punched the person - I get that the news don't want possible legal issues with influence and whatnot...but it's not an even playing field...as the victim in all this was outed as being drunk that they failed to follow orders to leave, and resisted...arrest? Is that what they're trying to convince was happening here? Anyway...

My comments:

• The officer has been identified in news articles as being the State of NSW's Police Commissioner's son (like father like son?) 
• The officer's 'partner' nor the security personal seemingly nothing to stop the brutality
• The officer completely ignores the screaming spectators plea
• The attack appears methodical...with the officer having enough time to think about his course of action as the others constrain the victim
• The officer didn't seem to understand that citizen's don't tolerate this mass abuse of power...or that almost everyone has a video camera on them at all times
• Again, the media (some? not all?) discriminates by presuming the police to be innocent until proven guilty, however the victim is branded as a drunk who didn't do as told and resisted.
• Police have ample tools to deal with such situations...I mean when the victim was held back by FOUR people why didn't he just whip out the hand cuffs and drag him out where he wouldn't cooperate with walking to the police vehicle?

Another element is the responsible service of alcohol laws...these particular cricket games at the Sydney Cricket Ground (SCG) have had full strength beer reintroduced where other events are limited to selling low of mid strengths. With this incident occurring so soon after these changes you'd have to imagine that this will be dragged into question thanks to a thuggish prick in a uniform with a badge.