High-Quality Malt Barley for the World

Historically, Denmark has mainly exported goods such as animal products, grass and vegetable seeds, but malting barley for the global beer and whiskey production might be a less known Danish export success.

As the global food supply and production is increasingly under pressure, food and agricultural producers around the world are forced to increase production output while maintaining product quality. To produce sustainably, a food producer must use crops that have been made in areas of high productivity without compromising on quality and safety.

Extremely high and sought-after quality

The unique climatic conditions with a long and consistent growing season, gives some of the world’s greatest conditions to produce spring barley with high yields and large grains. These conditions have led Danish barley to be in high demand around the world due to the high starch content and a balanced level of protein. This makes them particularly useful for food productions such as malting and brewing of beer.

Denmark is one of the world’s largest malting barley exporters and accounts for roughly 12% and produces 1.3-1.5 million tons of malting barley

Also, Danish malting barley is based on 100% certified seeds (the certification rate in the rest of Europe is around 50%). The use of certified seeds has several benefits for the industry, e.g. variety purity ensuring a homogeneous good.

Finally, Denmark has ideal logistical conditions for grain production. Danish malting barley has an average distance of 25 kilometres (16 miles) from field to shipping facility. This short travel keeps transaction costs low compared to other larger countries.

Supplying the global market

Despite its size, Denmark is one of the world’s largest malting barley exporters accounting for roughly 12% of the world market and producing 1.3-1.5 million tons of malting barley out of which only a small fraction is malted in Denmark. Being one of Denmark’s large export goods, showing how high quality as well as Denmark’s unique climatic conditions cause Danish malt barley to be in high global demand.