Agreed: it’s bad. Rising gloom is hard to avoid in a decade that’s lurched from epidemic to war to inflation crisis and now the unseaming of the international rules-based order. We’ve watched, open mouthed, as social media inverts truth and populist manipulation corrodes justice. Could it get any worse? It could. We’re unfriending solace: the shared glass with which to seek perspective.
Global wine consumption in the 21st century peaked at 250 million hectolitres (hl) between 2007 and 2008; it slid to 221 million hl in 2023. UK beer sales in 2023 were 21 per cent lower than in 2018; in the US, they are at their lowest levels since the 1970s. The value of Scotch whisky exports tumbled by 18 per cent in the first half of 2024 alone. The only alcoholic drink in surging demand is as black as our prospects: Guinness.
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