Russian brewer to enter South African market

Major Russian brewer Baltika is planning exports to South Africa and intends to use the country as a continental hub, the company’s head of overseas sales, Oleg Lazarenko, has announced.  

Lazarenko revealed the plans during an event held this week by the Russian Ministry of Agriculture and the Agroexport federal center, which was also attended by South African representatives.  

Baltika already exports to more than 40 countries, but not yet South Africa, Lazarenko noted. “We intend to discover the market of South Africa, choose a reliable distributor, and jointly establish active beer sales from Russia, to jointly promote our brands and support these sales,” he stated.  

 “The next strategy will be to set South Africa as a logistics hub to supply beer to other African markets,” he added.  

Baltika is Russia’s leading beer exporter and operates eight breweries. According to Lazarenko, it boasts a market share of more than 46% in domestic beer sales, equating to up to 1 billion liters annually. 

The brewery already exports beer to the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Kenya, Sudan, Ethiopia, Uganda, Ghana, Tanzania, Cote d’Ivoire, Guinea, Benin, Burkina Faso, and Cameroon. 

On Tuesday, Russian Deputy Minister of Agriculture Sergey Levin noted that from January to October, the turnover of agriculture products between Russia and South Africa amounted to $530 million, an almost 30% increase on the same period last year.