Germov, J. & McIntyre, J. 2013
The Conversation, 5 June 2013.
Think of alcohol in Australian life and you probably think of beer: a “hard-earned thirst”and all that.
Yet our national drinking taste is undergoing a dramatic change. Not only are we drinking less overall, but beer no longer dominates the contents of the national glass. Consumption trends now show that wine may soon be our drink of choice in terms of the type of alcohol consumed.
Whereas 50 years ago Australians drank 20 times more beer than wine, the comparison has narrowed to only three times more beer by volume. Beer is lower in alcohol than wine so if we look at pure alcohol rather than total fluid consumed: very little separates the two.
