Norway bought less alcohol last year

6 liters of pure alcohol each of us last yearAlcohol . Photo pixabay.com

Each Norwegian bought an average figure of 6 litres of pure alcohol last year. This is a 0.5% decrease from the previous year, and a decline of 9.1% in the past ten years.

 

Approximately one third of the alcohol purchased in Norway is consumed as wine, 17% as spirit liquor, and 44% as beer, according to Statistics Norway (SSB) figures.

Registered sales of spirits measured in pure alcohol per capita were on the same level in 2017 as in 2016.

There was more beer sold in 2017 than 2016, but sales of spirits and wine fell in terms of litres of finished product. So called ‘Rusbrus’ purchased by school leavers aged 18 and 19 accounts for 2.7% of total alcohol consumption.

The figures exclude tourist imports and tax free sales.

‘’It may seem positive that alcohol sales have fallen, but to conclude that alcohol consumption has decreased, we need to know more, said Sveinung Stensland, health policy spokesperson for Høyre (H).

He believes the numbers are of little value so long as we don’t have a full overview of cross-border trade and tax-free sales of alcohol.

“In addition, smuggling is a challenge. All of this must be seen in connection to the high alcohol tax we have in Norway’’, said Stensland.

 

© NTB Scanpix / #Norway Today