2025 Brewing Malt: Factors Affecting Pricing, 2024 Harvest Analysis, Malting & Forecasting

Malt is the backbone of your beer, and the ingredient which defines it. A raw ingredient which you’ll be using in the multiple of tonnes each year, reliant upon it to keep delivering regardless of beer style across core range, specials, and one-offs. In the run-up to Christmas, you face the challenges of production planning, forecasting for the new year, and amongst all this the looming question of malt pricing and quality for 2025. Understanding the current market and barley harvest is crucial for making informed decisions. This post is an analysis of the 2024 malt harvest, covering the general factors affecting the price of malt, initial 2025 malting data, forecasting, and pricing estimates.

Factors Affecting Malt Pricing

Before diving into specifics, it’s important to develop an understanding of the factors which affect the price of malting barley.

Global Cereals Market Impact on Barley Demand

It’s obvious of course, but unlike hops (which are pretty much for brewing only), beer has to compete for barley’s attention with a whole host of applications from direct food chain (raw ingredients) to indirect food chain (animal feed). This instantly puts us on the back foot as brewers, as we’re now in the global commodities game. Demand for barley is intrinsically linked to the health of the overall global cereals market. The symbiotic relationship between barley, wheat and maize  means that what affects one has a knock-on effect on the other. Because you can substitute these cereals – they are, after all, each perfectly capable of feeding someone, or something – a shortage of wheat or corn will drive up prices of barley as the global market flocks to barley as a cheaper replacement. Inversely, a glut of wheat or corn can mean better news for brewers as barley demand drops, stocks stay high, and prices fall.

Crop Competition for Barley

Agricultural land is finite, and farming operates on fine margins. As we know from the global hop market, a farmer will not continue to grow a crop they cannot find a home for if there is oversupply. This is why we are seeing some US hop farmers remove hop acreage. Similarly in cereal farming, if a farmer sees an oversupply of barley on the market and a greater demand for wheat and corn, they’ll simply sow these crops instead as they’ll be more profitable. The process will then become cyclical, as barley oversupply becomes scarcity, and prices rise again. Government interventions – like our Sustainable Farming Incentive here in the UK, can also influence farmers decisions when sowing new crops, and shouldn’t be underestimated as a factor, especially if British farmers driven by a change in focus because of the Inheritance Tax announcements in the 2024 UK October Budget.

Malt Prices Influenced by Geopolitics & Trade

It doesn’t take much imagination to see how an interconnected global market becomes directly affected by geopolitics. The Russian invasion of Ukraine had a huge effect as we know. Our crippling energy prices (making heating that kettle and that taproom a nightmare) also affected the cost of malting given the energy required to germinate and kiln barley. That’s not to mention the cost of the raw barley itself, which rose over concerns of a shortage of wheat, given that Ukraine accounted for 10% of the global export market for grain prior to the invasion. Likewise, the behaviour of the US  – given its agricultural scale, population, and global influence – always has to be taken into account, as well as the qualities of its own harvests, and trade policies. The regularly published USDA World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates can be a pretty handy source of information here.

Climate Change & Malt Pricing

Speak to any farmer and they’ll tell you that the single most stressful aspect of farming is that which is totally outside of individual control – climate and weather. As our climate changes and weather patterns become more erratic, crops are hit hard. Extreme periods of drought or flooding at any time during the year can drastically impact crop yields of any grains, which in turn will have a knock-on effect in the supply chain and on our barley malt pricing. It can’t just be as simple as hoping for a good barley harvest in a barley growing region either, there will need to be the right conditions for good grain harvests generally in all regions to see favourable pricing.

2024 Malt Harvest

Now that we’ve established the factors at play in our malt pricing, how is the 2024 harvest shaping up, and what are 2025 malt prices likely to look like?

Weather Conditions Affecting Malt Harvest 2024

In our region here in the UK and Northern Europe, brewing malt consists of barley from two growing periods – the winter barley (sown September-October, harvested the following July-August), and the spring barley (March-April, harvested August-September of the same year). Unsurprisingly, weather conditions around sowing and harvesting here drastically affect planning, and yields.

Winter Barley 2024

For 2024 compared to 2023 winter barley production was down a massive 26% as a result of “exceptionally wet weather” (in the words of the Met Office). Early 2024 and into Spring was also marked by poor weather which didn’t help any of the grain crops – with around 130% more rainfall than the 1991-2020 average and only 83-90% of the sunshine during this key period for the grains to ‘flower’. All this meant a perfect ‘storm’ for poor yields of winter barley. Wheat saw a poor harvest in the UK for 2024 too, a decrease of 22% year on year, with yield down 12.1% too. It was the smallest wheat harvest since 2020. France fared even worse, enduring “catastrophic” consequences as a result of similar poor weather to the UK, with their worst wheat harvest for 40 years.

The extremely wet weather for the winter barley meant that a lot of the nitrogen in the soil was heavily diluted, which naturally had a knock-on effect on the nitrogen levels of the winter barley harvested. Current samples of UK winter barley are trending around 15% lower nitrogen content than the top end of what is considered ideal by maltsters. But more on that later.

Spring Barley 2024

Fortunately, things didn’t look quite as bad when we got to the 2024 spring barley. Yields here were up by 10% and area harvested up 28%. The poor early spring weather in 2024 turned positive in the late spring and summer, which was ideal for establishing the spring barley crop. There was slightly less rainfall year on year for June, but still some showers, and a good warm spell in July which was great for the barley’s flowering period. There was variation between UK regions, but Southern England (where a lot of our barley is grown) was a lot drier than average during the summer, which is ideal conditions for harvesting.

Germany too saw a relatively good Spring Barley season, with our friends at BESTMALZ reporting the warmest March ever recorded but with some rainfall which resulted in a good water supply. Tillering and grain filling phases were both good, with ripening slightly affected by rain. This means German spring barley stocks are very healthy, in the good to very good range.

Across the UK and Germany, total nitrogen still remains slightly on the low side. Overall, good yields of spring barley helped to offset a pretty disastrous winter barley for the UK.

2024 Harvest Analysis for 2025 Brewing Malt – Early Signs

We’ve chatted to maltsters at both Bairds Malt and BESTMALZ to get some insights into what the 2024 intake of barley is looking like for malting into 2025. The good news is that the mixed bag of the harvest between poor winter barley and very good spring barley has resulted is a good outcome of excellent quality malt for our brews (and beer) in 2025. That said though, total nitrogen levels in malt in the UK are on the lower end (~1.5%) of the target nitrogen spec (a rule of thumb ‘ideal’ target spec tends to be 1.6-1.75%) and, similarly, in Germany – where they measure protein levels – these levels are lower year on year too. The positive news is that from micromalt and initial malting analysis carried out thus far, the actual levels of soluble nitrogen is looking as it should, and so the maltsters are happy it will sit within a good SNR ratio specification for brewing. Analysis so far of extract and diastatic power of 2024 harvest show very positive results, again in spite of total nitrogen levels at the lower end of the spec. Given that this analysis is taking place at this time of year, we can also reasonably expect that extract will continue to improve as the barley matures over the coming months. Friability is already largely meeting specification at this early stage, and again is expected to improve still further as the malt matures. In Heidelberg Germany, the BESTMALZ team reports that the 2024 malt harvest improved on the 2023 harvest with better sorting values, lower gelatinization temperatures, and, crucially, even more desirable grain colour appearance with a return to a pleasing straw yellow.

All in all, things currently look on track for a nice quality 2025 malt intake for your brews. Products like AB Vickers Yeastlife Extra and Servomyces Zinc Enriched Yeast nutrient will allow you to ensure your yeast performs at its maximum efficiency with your 2025 malt intake, and we’ll also be adding more AB Vickers process aids to our portfolio of brewing aids and finings in the new year, and, as always, you’ll be able to draw on the superb knowledge and expertise of Sarah and the AB Vickers team to gain insights into how best to optimise your brew with brewing aids for the 2025 malt.

Brewing Malt Pricing for 2025

Despite the challenges of the winter barley harvest, the good spring barley harvest means that stocks are looking good for 2025 malt. In the UK, estimates for barley consumption are in line with their 5 year averages, but forecast demand in our sector is trending slightly lower. This means there is generally a slight increase in barley availability in the UK currently, which will be welcome news for brewers as it should result in more competitive pricing for 2025 malt vs 2024. There are still a lot of factors at play though, so it’s essential to understand the whole picture. Whilst current availability is good, the barley stock availability overall has driven up forecast demand for barley in feed to 197 Kt in the UK year on year, and there’s likely to be a lower demand for imports as a result too, which will have an impact on our overall barley ‘balance’.

There always remains a possibility of a correction in pricing, which is something to guard against. The generationally poor wheat harvest in Europe could well place demands on barley, especially given continued sanctions against Russia, a large wheat producer. The impact of Trump’s second term remains a big unknown, particularly any effect from proposed import tariffs on Mexico, which can have a knock-on effect on demand on US Maize exports. That’s before we consider other factors at play in costs too – energy, transport, and labour. Making malting barley is a costly, complex and labour intensive process, as we can all attest.

Malt Agreements Guarantee the Best Stable Price for 2025 Malt

The above unknowns all highlight the importance of a good dialogue with your malt supplier, and of the utility of a malt agreement in guarding you against pricing shocks in the market. Much like when discussing a hop contract, talking to your sales manager about your needs for a malt agreement for the coming year is the key way to mitigate against risk – guaranteeing your supply of crucial great quality malt at competitive pricing and ensuring you don’t get caught out by the market by giving you (and your accounts team) stable pricing for the upcoming year. On the subject of pricing, it’s essential to talk to your supplier about your options, as it’s in both of your interests to get results which will serve you both well over the coming year. As with each of your ingredients suppliers, ensuring a good flow of information, knowledge, and expertise will allow you to get the best possible outcome in terms of quality malt, easy, efficient next day delivery when you need it, and great product support from the experts. And, crucially, help you get on with the job at hand – brewing great beer!