How much do Belgians actually spend on booze?

How much do Belgians actually spend on booze?
Prime Minister Alexander De Croo and Senate chairwoman Stephanie D'Hose pictured during the 2022 edition of the Belgian Beer Weekend festival in Brussels. Credit: Nicolas Maeterlinck / Belga

Of all the things Belgium is known for, few are as celebrated as its alcohol: in particular, its beer. But how much do Belgians actually spend on booze?

Surprisingly perhaps, the answer is not that much. According to a report published on Wednesday by Eurostat, the EU's official statistics office, Belgians spent an average of 1.7% of their household income on alcohol in 2021 – a touch below the EU average of 1.8% and only the 18th highest overall within the bloc.

The same study also found that Latvians spent the greatest proportion of their income on alcoholic beverages (5.0%), followed by Estonia (4.7%) and Poland (3.7%). By contrast, Greece and Italy spent the least (1.0%).

In terms of net expenditure, France spent by far the greatest amount on alcohol at €22 billion — far ahead of second place Poland, which spent €11.7 billion. By contrast, Belgium spent a relatively paltry €3.9 billion.

In total, households in the EU purchased €128 billion worth of alcoholic beverages in 2021, equivalent to almost 1% of the bloc's total GDP.

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Only Croatia registered an increase in average alcohol expenditure from 2020 to 2021 (+0.6 percentage points). Ireland on the other hand recorded the largest decrease in average expenditure (-0.5 percentage points), followed by Latvia and Lithuania (-0.4 percentage points).

Belgium was one of the ten EU countries for which the average alcohol expenditure remained unchanged.


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