A review of the EU hop industry involvement within a beer brewing sector.

ABSTRACT The aim of this paper is to give an overview of the EU hop industry structure, production characteristics and its economic position within the world beer industry. This article is based on authors’ research results, activities within the International Hop Growers’ Convention (IHGC) and a review of the literature available. The results demonstrate that the production structure in the hop industry sector varies greatly across EU countries. Furthermore, the structure is changing due to a market-driven structural adjustment aimed at being more competitive. The number of farms growing hops in the main hop-producing countries in the EU declined significantly during the 2000-2008 period. As a result, the average farm size increased in almost all EU member states. The rate of specialization of hops farms is generally increasing. Hop farmers are stepwise becoming entrepreneurs, trying to achieve a farm size that creates production more lucrative. Key words: hop industry, beer markets, production structure, competitiveness