New opportunities for microbreweries in Thailand

Is Thailand set to see a microbrewery renaissance? New regulations are coming into effect today that open the door for small distilleries and breweries. The regulation was published in The Royal Gazette last night and is effective immediately. The new regulations outline rules that loosen restrictions on small breweries and even allow home alcohol distilling for personal use.

The new measures aim to improve quality control to make sure that large and small liquor producers alike follow acceptable standards. They also improve tax collection for alcohol producers. The new decree was proposed by the Ministry of Finance to amend the 2017 rules and was approved by the Cabinet yesterday morning.

Now, microbreweries and small liquor distillation operations will be allowed to compete with the big guys, opening the door to independent brewers in an open market for beer and alcohol. Breweries that have between seven and 50 employees and are producing output using machinery between five and 50 horsepower will be allowed to produce and sell beer and alcohol under the new regulations.

Previously, small community liquor producers were only allowed to have a maximum of seven workers and machinery that ran on a maximum of five horsepower. There are caveats, however, that the liquor manufacturers must have held a liquor license for at least a year and have no offences recorded under the excise law. Any violations must have been cleared for at least one year before small community operations can expand to 50 employees and large machinery.

Beer brewing will also see restrictions lifted, with the previous minimum of 100,000 litres a year output being repealed. Microbreweries can produce up to one million litres per year, now with no minimum. Large breweries are required to produce at least 10 million litres per year and have a 10 million baht minimum in registered capital, according to Thai Newsroom.

This opens the opportunity for small producers and microbreweries to compete as long as their machinery and equipment follow public health laws and environmental and official standards.

Finally, the new loosened restrictions will allow people to obtain a non-commercial liquor production license. That license permits them to produce up to 200 litres of alcohol per year for home use. The license will be granted to qualifying people over the age of 20, as long as they have large enough facilities to safely produce alcohol. Using other licensed facilities to produce their liquor is strictly banned, and environmental and alcohol consumption safety rules must be followed.