Looking to cash in on the burgeoning beer consumption in the country, the United Kingdom-based SABMiller will invest around Rs 500 crore to expand production capacities at its breweries in the country."The company has earmarked an investment of Rs 100 crore every year for the next five years to expand capacity," Sandeep Kumar, director (corporate affairs), SABMiller said.He said under the expansion programme, production capacities of the company's breweries in Haryana and Andhra Pradesh would be increased, for which it has sought permission from the state governments.SABMiller has 10 production facilities in India with production capacity of around 42 million cases per annum. The company plans to increase the capacity by 8 million cases by the end of this year, Kumar said."We will keep increasing our capacity according the growth of beer consumption in India. Last year the growth was around 20% and we are also expanding our capacity by around 20% this year," he added.Speaking about the company's project in Haryana, he said, "We are in the process of getting permission from the state government and could say about the exact capacity enhancement only after that."The brewery at Sonepat has a capacity of one million cases annually, which it is keen to expand to meet demand from North India.SABMiller has also sought permission from the Andhra Pradesh government to expand capacity of its Hyderabad-based brewery, Charminar, he added without specifying details.
