Azerbaijan: Carlsberg feels good in Azerbaijan, plans to develop beer production in country

Lars Lehmann, Executive Vice President for Carlsberg Group's Eastern Europe region, said in a recent interview that the company is very pleased to see the great efforts made by Azerbaijani government to develop the business environment, AzerNews reported on June 21.

“Our business feels good in the Azerbaijani market, and we plan to develop beer production in the coming years,” Lehmann said.

He emphasized favourability of investment climate in Azerbaijan and added that after the fall in oil prices in 2015, the government placed even greater emphasis on stimulating the non-energy sector, so as a result, the company observed positive changes in the business environment.

Speaking about sustainable development results, Lehmann stressed that Carlsberg Azerbaijan achieved astounding results in this sphere saying that in three years, the company has reduced consumption of natural gas by 34 percent, water - by 43 percent and electricity - by 33 percent.

Further Lars Lehmann stated that Carlsberg increased revenues by 4.8 percent, net profit - by 6.5 percent and operating profit - by 11 percent.

“For Carlsberg Azerbaijan, 2018 was also very successful. Carlsberg Azerbaijan was able to continue the growth in all indicators,” he said.

Having underlined that presence of intense and fair competition in the market is one of the main reasons of the growth, Lehmann stated that there is competition in the local beer market, mainly with small brewing companies, and despite the fact that the beer market in Azerbaijan is relatively small, there are high-quality beer brands in the country.

Touching on peculiarities of Azerbaijani beer market, Lehmann noted that local consumers prefer lager beer. He added that another feature of the market is surprisingly cheap spirits, especially vodka.

“In the markets where we work, we usually see a fairly large price gap between strong and light alcoholic beverages, which corresponds to the policy of promoting beverages with a lower percentage of alcohol to reduce alcohol consumption in general, but in Azerbaijan this gap is very small,” Lehmann said.

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