SABMiller

This article is part of the Spinwatch public health oriented Alcohol Portal project.

SABMiller is one of the world’s leading brewers with brewing interests or major distribution agreements in over 60 countries spread across six continents.The group's brands include premium international beers such as Grolsch, Miller Genuine Draft, Peroni Nastro Azzurro and Pilsner Urquell, as well as market-leading local brands such as Aguila, Castle, Miller Lite, Snow and Tyskie. SABMiller is also one of the largest bottlers of Coca-Cola products in the world. Prior to 2002 SABMiller was known as South African Breweries, the merger of the Miller Brewing Company, owned by Philip Morris (now Altria) between 1969 and 2002, was the reason for the name change.

Tobacco archive uncovers alcohol industry strategies

As Philip Morris was the former owner of Miller Brewing Company, researchers have been able to uncover some interesting insights into how the alcohol industry operates by accessing confidential industry documents, made public in 1998, when the Master Settlement Agreement (MSA) forced publication of tobacco industry documents. “We realised that some international tobacco companies have owned alcohol companies, so we could obtain information on this industry as well,” said Professor of Health Policy, Mike Daube, one of the authors of the report . The data comes right from the top of Philip Morris with documents intended for CEOs of the tobacco giant now publicly available. According to the researchers: "The measures they [The Alcohol Industry] fear most are higher taxes, tighter restrictions on advertising, marketing and sales, health warnings, blood alcohol content lowering and measures to increase legal drinking age. They are also worried about any attempts to place “restrictions on the use of athletes/celebrities”. The research also makes public some of the strategies used by alcohol companies to protect their business, ranging from direct opposition to public health policy approaches and diversion strategies to the development and strengthening of relationships with other industries to assist them in their attempts to avoid formal legislation.

As public health campaigners have long known, the alcohol industry does not want to be seen in the same light as the tobacco industry. It fights hard to disassociate its products and companies from the wide-ranging harm associated with alcohol.

Pushing alcohol policy in Africa

SABMiller are actively trying to develop national alcohol policies in Africa, many African nations do not have alcohol control policies and the industry has been keen to work with governments to develop strategies to reduce alcohol related harm. According to SAB's own account:

Together with members of government, public health, non-government organisations and industry, we drafted a policy that puts into place licensing laws and penalties, regulations on the sale and marketing of alcohol including server training and trading hours, requirements for education on lower-risk drinking and increased use of screening and intervention techniques.

The policy was adopted in October 2007, and was the first of its kind in Africa. We have subsequently been working in a similar way in Swaziland (policy adopted in 2008), and in Uganda, Zambia, Malawi, and Ghana to help tailor policies to each country.

Mitch Ramsay a policy adviser with SAB has been working with Damon Ansell of Diageo in conjunction with Kieth R. Evans of the Washington based International Center for Alcohol Policies (ICAP). Working with groups such as the Ghanaian free market think tank IMANI ICAP seem to be leading the way in lobbying African governments to develop alcohol industry friendly public health policies, and Evans appears to be their man in Africa.

Affiliations

According to SABMiller's website, its partners are:

• International Center for Alcohol Policies
• The Drinkaware Trust
• CEO Water Mandate
• Business Action for Africa
• World Economic Forum 2009 Industry Partner
• European Alcohol and Health Forum
• Altria Part Owners of SABMiller
• Business Action for Africa
• The United Nations Global Compact (UNGC)
• International Business Leaders Forum (IBLF)
• Global Business Coalition on HIV/Aids, Tuberculosis and Malaria (GBC)
• Chatham House's Africa programme