• Barley grain being steeped at the Coopers Malting Plant in Adelaide. (Image: John Krüger for Coopers)
    Barley grain being steeped at the Coopers Malting Plant in Adelaide. (Image: John Krüger for Coopers)
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Coopers has doubled its malt exports in the past 12 months, sending around 35,000 tonnes of malt a year to food processors and brewers in South Korea, Thailand and Singapore.

The annual exports represent more than half of the Coopers maltings capacity, and In January, the brewer recorded its best month for exports at around 3700 tonnes of malt.

Coopers maltings manager Dr Doug Stewart said that despite the impacts of COVID-19 on the brewing sector worldwide, demand for high quality malt had not been affected.

“In March this year, we exported 3100 tonnes, compared with less than 1000 tonnes in March 2019,” said Stewart.

“Because a good proportion of our exports are going into the food trade, we are not meaningfully impacted by any slowdown experienced by brewers.”

Stewart says one of the key selling points for overseas customers was the quality of the malt produced, “which is a result of high quality barley sourced from South Australian farmers and our state-of-the-art equipment”.

Around 15,000 tonnes of malt a year is used in Coopers’ beer production, DIY beer concentrates and malt extract production, with smaller volumes sold to other Australian brewers and food producers.

Coopers Brewery was ranked at #83 in the Australia’s Top 100 Food & Drink Companies 2019 report.

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