Maxwell Jumah, Managing Director of GIHOC Distilleries, talks about the evolution of the alcoholic beverages market in Ghana.

"The environment has been changing. In the past, Ghana was a beer drinking country. Only the very elite drank wine and cognac, etc. Gradually, the general population has moved primarily to bitters. The consumption of beer is still big but not as much as it used to be. Many beer manufacturers have folded. This trend is transient in the sense that if you study the European market, they also went through this shift. In the future, people will be more conscious about their personal health and a little more careful about what they are taking. If it will stay bitters, I see a shift to medicinal qualities or more fruit-based and mineral-based alcohols. People will look at the health benefits they will get from drinking. Now, we have 43 companies producing bitters. GIHOC started quite a while ago with the introduction of Mandingo Bitters which was coopted from the Italian bitters industry. Gradually, we developed local bitters, which is our Herb Afrik, with more emphasis on the medicinal qualities. This put GIHOC and especially Herb Afrik into a very strategic position for the future. As the taste shifts to medicinal and health conscious consumers, Herb Afrik is uniquely poised to take advantage of that new taste", says Maxwell Jumah.

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