In case there were any readers wondering why Charles, Joe and I have not been often posting on the wonderful brews of China, I have had to come to terms with a few things about life in China and, while, as well as AsiaPundit, I maintain a personal blog and contribute to the Good Beer Blog. I haven't been contributing to the GBB as much recently - nor have fellow China-based beer bloggers Joe the Unabrewer and Charles at YellowFrog. There is a reason for that. SABMiller CFO Malcolm Wyman explains (via The China Stock Blog):

....the beer industry in China is way behind in levels of sophistication....you're talking about what perhaps the U.S. or other industries might have looked like 50 to 80 years ago when you have total fragmentation across the country. When we entered you had over 800 breweries we are now down to I think just under 400 breweries... there are so many cheap beers that those are definitely not brandable. We try and move our beers up into the upper mainstream and the local premium levels where you can get slightly better margin....but if you take the vast amount of beer and if you take your normal pyramid - probably from two thirds and down is all very much low quality, low-priced beer and that beer is certainly lacking in any sort of brand capacity.