New Zealand Breweries

Beer is the most popular alcoholic drink in New Zealand, accounting for 63% of available alcohol for sale. At around 64.7 litres per person per annum, New Zealand is ranked 27th in global beer consumption per capita. The vast majority of beer produced in New Zealand is a type of lager, either pale or amber in colour, and typically 4% – 5% alcohol by volume.

Although the two largest breweries in New Zealand, Lion Nathan and DB Breweries, control almost 90% of sales by volume between them, there are over 150 smaller craft breweries and brewpubs producing a vast range of beer styles, including many ales.

The first beer brewed in New Zealand was by Captain Cook while anchored in Ship Cove in the outer reaches of Queen Charlotte Sound in January 1770. Here Cook experimented with the use of young Rimu branches as a treatment against scurvy. It was brewed on Saturday 27 March 1773 on Resolution Island, in Dusky Sound, Fiordland. The beer was brewed using wort with addition of molasses and rimu bark and leaves. Captain James Cook brewed a beer flavoured with local spruce tree needles while visiting New Zealand in 1773 in order to combat scurvy aboard his ship.

We also began to brew beer from the branches or leaves of a tree, which much resembles the American black-spruce. From the knowledge I had of this tree, and the similarity it bore to the spruce, I judged that, with the addition of inspissated juice of wort and molasses, it would make a very wholesome beer, and supply the want of vegetables, which this place did not afford; and the event proved that I was not mistaken.

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