On Tuesday the Centraal Bureau voor de Statistiek (CBS) reaffirmed that the Netherlands is the largest beer exporter in the European Union (a title it has held for 21 years), reports Ice today. In 2020, Dutch brewers exported € 1.9 billion worth of beer. First of all to the United States - the most important buyer -. France and the United Kingdom follow.

In Holland, beer production dates back to the Middle Ages and the most famous brewery - Heineken - holds the largest share of the market. In total in 2020 there were 605 licensed breweries. Globally, the Netherlands are in second place, while in the medal table gold goes to Mexico, which exports more than double the Dutch, or 4.3 billion a year of which the overwhelming amount - 71% - is headed for the United States.

However, according to the German CBS, the historic record of Holland is threatened by neighboring Belgium. The country is gaining positions, and in 2020 it exported up to 1.7 billion euros of beer. Germany and France, on the other hand, are the third and fourth largest exporters respectively. Finally, the Netherlands is also the largest exporter of non-alcoholic beer, a position in which it has been steadfast since 2017: since it supplanted Germany, the country has in fact exported non-alcoholic beer for 121 million euros. Speaking of alcohol free beer, Poland is the fourth largest producer in the EU, according to data from Tygodnik Gospodarczy, the Polish Economic Institute (see EFA News).