Exhibition Ale

Breweries were very proud of winning medals in beer competitions. They still are, now I think about it.

I've found loads of adverts bigging up victories. But were they playing fair? Were they entering their standard beers, or were they brewing up something special? (It's an accusation that's been thrown around more recently, too.) I only know this: I've found a few brews in the logs marked as being for an exhibition or competition.

Of course, some stretched the rules. So why shouldn't I?

August is competition entry time. For beer hacks like me. Not just the British one now, but the US one, too. Time for me me rush out my exhibition tome. A book mostly intended as a competition entry.

As a lowly blogger and occasional magazine writer, I like to have something more lumpy to throw at the judges. Something that looks vaguely like a book, rather than just some flimsy internet crap.

Last year's effort I thought one of my best books. Vaguely coherent and with jokes. Hang on, I'll just check how many copies I've shifted of it . . . . . wow . . eleven . . . but I bought six of those. An impressive five actual sales. I doubt this year's exhibition book will match that.

What can the three or four of you expect this year? You remember all those filler posts maquerading as beer reviews? With elastic bands and selotape I've made something resembling a book out of them. If you don't look too closely. I'm, really selling this, aren't I?

Should you feel inclined, you can waste your money here:

Sorry, but it's dead expensive because I want the images in colour.

I'd buy a copy as an investment if I were you. Assuming you can track me down to sign it. It'll be one of the rarest of my many rare books. I'm buying 20 copies, signing them and burying them. The map showing where they are is the kids' inheritance. I plan drinking away the house. (Don't tell Dolores that.)

Let's Brew Wednesday - 1939 William Younger XXX

Now I’ve started I may as well do the set of William Younger 1939 Mild Ales. This is the stronger version, XXX.

I’m not going to pretend that it’s hugely different from XX. It contains exactly the same ingredients, though the proportions are slightly different. Slightly less pale malt and a little more of everything else. It’s not a massive difference.

This beer slips perfectly into what I would call the Ordinary Mild slot. A beer that would have cost 5d a pint in London. In the late 1930’s, there were three types of Mild in London. 4d Ale at 1030º at 4d per pint; Mild at 1037º at 5d per pint and Best Mild at 1043º at 6d per pint. With the middle one being the most popular. Though not every brewery made all three types.

The crappy degree of attenuation – the lactose won’t help – leaves XXX at just over 3% ABV. So it must have been quite a full-bodied beer. An FG of 1014º is high for a beer with a relatively low OG. But clearly that’s what the brewery was aiming for. As I mentioned for XX, this is really a watered-down No. 1 Strong Ale. The grists are very similar, except there’s no invert sugar in the No. 1.

Again I assume that this was primarily sold south of the border. This class of beer didn’t exist in Scotland. At least I haven’t found another similar Scottish beer. William Younger seems to have stuck with brewing proper Milds – not just a low-gravity Pale Ale with added sugar – much longer than anyone else in Scotland. Extensive trade in England (not just the Northeast of England where many Scottish brewers were active and Mild was also a rarity) is the most obvious explanation.

Even by the standards of Mild the hopping rate is very low. Barclay’s X, a beer of a similar gravity, contained three times the volume of hops. While Whitbread X contained four times as many. Younger XX and XXX are some of the most lightly-hopped British beers I’ve ever come across.

1939 William Younger XXX
pale malt	5.25 lb	64.42%
crystal malt 60L	0.50 lb	6.13%
mild malt	0.40 lb	4.91%
grits	1.25 lb	15.34%
invert sugar	0.25 lb	3.07%
lactose	0.50 lb	6.13%
liquorice	0.25 oz
Fuggles 90 min	0.50 oz
Fuggles 30 min	0.25 oz
Goldings dry hops	0.25 oz
OG	1037
FG	1014
ABV	3.04
Apparent attenuation	62.16%
IBU	11
SRM	6
Mash at	154º F
Sparge at	160º F
Boil time	105 minutes
pitching temp	61º F
Yeast	WLP028 Edinburgh Ale

Random Dutch beers (part thirty-eight)

Back again with my bollocky stuff.

I had last weekend, being in Berlin. This time last week I was drinking Czech Lageron Karl-Marx-Allee with Dolores. And eating really nice food. of the chunky, meaty variety, mostly.

Love the Berlin International Beer Festival. The least nerdy beer festival I know. Barely a beard in sight. But loads of 'taches. Some truly horrendous beers. But loads from smallish German and Czech breweries. A rare chance to try dark and semi-dark Lagers.

Cornelia Blond 6.5%, ABV
I got this from Deen, I think. Just after Christmas. Which has me thinking. Yeah, as I thought. Signs of oxidation. I've left it too long. Not fair to give an opinion, as it's clearly seen better days. Like eating the corn flake packet rather than its contents.

That doesn't stop me offering Dolores a try.

"Do you want to try my beer, Dolores?"

"I just drank some wine. Can I enjoy that first?"

Grudgingly, "I suppose so."

A few minutes later. "Do you want to try my beer, Dolores?"

"It looks like a horrible one.

"It's from Deen."

"OK. Mm. Not too bad. What's that on your shirt? It was clean this morning."

I've been assembling my competition book this weekend. A panic throw-together, rushed out to meet the Beer Hacks' award deadline. This year's will be called Home!. You'll discover why soon.

Oedipus Thai Thai, 8% ABV
An Amsterdam beer. Though, very honestly, the label tells me that it was brewed by Scheldebrouwerij in Belgium. I've drunk this several times before. A Tripel made with Thai spices. Something that could easily be a lorry stuck on a level crossing hit by an airliner. I quite like it. Oddly, I find the result reminiscent of Tripel Karmeliet. That's a compliment.

Talking of Oedipus, I was at another beer festival yeasterday that they host. The Kimchi Festival. It started as a food festival, but has been getting beerier by the year. It's a beer festival* with food now. Mostly local and small. Or very small. Its odd location over the water on the former NDSM shipyard site keeps all but the most informed and determined tourist out.

Excuse me if I go all touristist, but it really is getting beyond a joke in Amsterdam. Send the tourists back to touristonia, I say. Town's full of them, suddenly stopping and standing, walking blindly in front of trams and generally getting in my bloody way. Bastards. And stumbling around, stinking of weed, pissing their kecks. Or was that my visiting friends?

"Do you want to try my beer, Andrew?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"Because I've only just got up."

"That didn't stop me."

"Do you want to try my beer, Dolores?"

"No, it's that horrible one."

"It's a diffferent one. From Oedipus. It has Thai spices in it."

"I wouldn't have said that that. I can't taste them"



* Serving a proper fucking measure this year. In a lined glass. Most were well over the 15 cl line. About 2 cl. For 2 euros a pop. Not bad at all for the 8% ABV and above stuff I was going for.

UK beer exports average value per barrel 1950 – 1952

The title says it all. Believe me, it’s not quite as dull as it might sound.

As usual, I couldn’t resist extrapolating other figures from the table supplied. Having the value and volume of beer exported to each destination, it was simple enough to calculate the average price of each barrel.

I expected that the prices would be roughly similar for each destination. It turns out that’s way wide of the the mark. In a very surprising way. First though, a little contextualisation in terms of prices. At this time a pint of Ordinary Mild retailed for around 1s a pint. That comes to a bit over £14 for a 36-gallon barrel. Bitter retailing at 1s 4d per pint was around £19 per barrel.

Though obviously a big chunk of that was the tax. About £9 for a barrel of Mild at 1030º and £12 for Bitter at 1040º. The brewer would get the tax returned through “drawback” if were exported, of course.

Hopefully that makes these numbers more understandable.

UK beer exports average value per barrel 1950 - 1952
destination	1950	1951	1952
imports	£4.69	£4.89	£5.77
To British West Africa	£12.31	£12.99	£13.59
Malaya	£12.34	£12.79	£14.38
Hong Kong	£12.88	£13.18	£14.18
Australia	£12.33	£12.98	£13.54
British West Indies	£15.48	£15.86	£17.01
Other Commonwealth Countries and the Irish Republic	£11.20	£12.70	£13.03
Belgium	£6.65	£6.31	£6.62
Other Foreign Countries	£13.35	£13.98	£14.68
Total	£11.44	£12.11	£12.57
re-exports	£16.95	£17.99	£18.59
Source:
"Brewers Guardian 1953" February, page 81.

See what the big surprise is? Belgium. The value per barrel is half what it was elsewhere. I’m still scratching my head trying to work out why.

I understand why the West Indies tops the list. The beer sent there was mostly Foreign Extra Stout or Strong Scotch Ale. Strong, expensibe beers. But hang on. Strong Scotch Ale was a lot of what went to Belgium. So wht was the average value of exports to there worth just half as much? It makes absolutely no sense to me.

It’s interesting to see how much cheaper imported beer was than that exported. Even cheaper than the beer sent to Belgium. Though I can sort of see some sense there. Most imports were Lager. But not full-stregnth Continental Lager. No, it was stuff brewed especially watery for the UK. Like the 3.2% ABV version of Heineken Pils.

I think I’ll end with another table. This time showing the price per pint of imports and exports.

UK beer exports averageprice per pint 1950 - 1952
destination	1950	1951	1952
imports	3.91	4.08	4.80
To British West Africa	10.25	10.82	11.32
Malaya	10.28	10.66	11.99
Hong Kong	10.73	10.98	11.81
Australia	10.28	10.82	11.28
British West Indies	12.90	13.22	14.18
Other Commonwealth Countries and the Irish Republic	9.33	10.58	10.86
Belgium	5.54	5.26	5.52
Other Foreign Countries	11.12	11.65	12.24
Total	9.53	10.10	10.47
re-exports	14.13	14.99	15.49

Remember, a pint of draught beer cost 12 – 18d down the pub.

Portsmouth & Brighton United Breweries beers in 1952

Sorry. More price list stuff. I just can’t resist. Especially as I have lots of details for this brewery’s beers.

Let’s kick off with the price list:

Portsmouth Evening News - Thursday 20 November 1952, page 7.

Let’s get stuck in. There are five draught beers in total. Which is quite a lot for the early 1950s. Many breweries would have only had two, Mild and Bitter. It’s a decent range: Bitter, Best Bitter, Mild, Old Ale and most interesting of all, Golden Ale.

It’s of note for a couple of reasons. The name, to start with. It gives a lie to anyone who thinks Golden Ales are a recent phenomenon. The price tells us a lot, too. It’s more than double the price of the Ordinary Bitter. Implying a beer of 1060º, at least. Which was incredibly strong for a draught beer back then. Especially a pale one.

Before I forget, here’s a few analyses of these Portsmouth United’s beers:

Portsmouth & Brighton United Breweries beers 1948 - 1951
Year	Beer	Style	Price per pint d	package	Acidity	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation	colour
1948	Double Stout	Stout	18	bottled	0.07	1033.6	1011	2.92	67.26%	210
1948	Brown Ale	Brown Ale	19	bottled	0.08	1038.2	1005.4	4.27	85.86%	55
1948	IPA	IPA	19	bottled	0.07	1033.8	1005.7	3.65	83.14%	20.5
1948	Pompey XXXXX	Strong Ale	21	bottled	0.08	1040.7	1009.4	4.06	76.90%	70
1949	Mild Ale	Mild	13	draught	0.08	1029.3	1003.1	3.41	89.42%	19
1950	India Pale Ale	IPA	15	bottled	0.04	1033.7	1009.4	3.15	72.11%	22
1951	Mild Ale	Mild	14	draught	0.04	1029.3	1005.1	3.14	82.59%	75
Sources:
Whitbread Gravity book held at the London Metropolitan Archives, document number LMA/4453/D/02/002.

A shame there’s no Golden Ale in there, you’re probably thinking. That’s what I thought at first, too. Then I remembered I’d been sent some brewing logs for the brewery. Some from around this period. And one is for Pompey Royal Golden Ale. The OG is 1060.5º. Around where I would have guessed.

I’ve just a few random records. Some from during the war, some from just after. Most of the beers in the table above have lower gravities than in 1940. But one is the same. And I mean exactly the same. In 1940 XX Mild had an OG of 1029.3. Spooky, eh?

Did you notice that the two Mild examples are totally different in colour? One is paler than the IPA, the other a darkish brown. Looks to me like they were making two version, one coloured with caramel and one not.

The bottled IPA listed seems to have starting calling itself Light Ale by 1952. Another great example of the fluidity of style designations in Britain.

Fancy taking a look at the recipes I have for Portsmouth United’s beers in the 1940s? I thought not. But I’ll publish them anyway.

Let's Brew - 1939 William Younger LAE

William Younger brewed a baffling range of Pale Ales before WW II. While most Scottish brewers would have three, Younger had loads.

At Maclay it was 5d, 6d and 7d PA. Beers which would after the war become 60/-, 70/- and 80/-. At Drybrough it was P 54/-, P 60/- and P 80/-. While Younger has P, XP, XP Btlg, XXP, XXP Btlg, XXPS, Ext, LAE and MXP E. Don’t ask me what the hell they all were and why they needed so many.

LAE comes second in the gravity pecking order after Ext. I’m fairly certain it was a bottled beer. Partly by gut feeling. But also because there’s another beer at the same gravity called XXPS which I know was a draught beer. Because I drank it myself. It was another name for Younger’s Scotch or 70/-, a beer that was fairly common in the 1970’s and 1980’s.

The recipe is, as usual, remarkably subtle and complex. Like hell it is. Just another of Younger’s pale malt and grits specials. It is untypical, in fact, of interwar Scottish Pale Ales. By this time most other brewers were using healthy doses of sugar and rather less in the way of maize. The more I research William Younger the more I realise how untypical they were in general. Just as well I’ve looked at other brewers’ records, too and haven’t based all my conclusions on William Younger. I’d be coming out with the sort of crap Horst Dornbusch does.

Sometime in the late 1930’s Younger seem to have gone over to all English hops. The records are no more specific than “Kent”. My guess is Fuggles. But Goldings wouldn’t be crazy, either.

Younger was a big fan of dry hopping. Pretty much all of their beers were dry hopped, including the weediest Milds. Other brewers could have been as keen, but most don’t bother recording dry hops on their brewing logs. Lazy bastards (I’m looking at you Whitbread).

1939 William Younger LAE
pale malt	7.75 lb	73.81%
grits	2.75 lb	26.19%
Fuggles 90 min	1.00 oz
Fuggles 30 min	1.00 oz
Goldings dry hops	0.50 oz
OG	1046
FG	1013
ABV	4.37
Apparent attenuation	71.74%
IBU	26
SRM	4
Mash at	156º F
Sparge at	160º F
Boil time	105 minutes
pitching temp	61.5º F
Yeast	WLP028 Edinburgh Ale

Provincial Mild 1955 – 1959

And here we are, finally. At the end of another overlong series. With way more detail than anyone other than me is ever likely to be interested in.

I say provincial Mild Ale, but it’s more like Northern Mild Ale. Only four of the breweries aren’t in the North: Hancock (Cardiff), Home (Nottingham), William Younger (Edinburgh) and Worthington (Burton).

What’s nice is having both the Ordinary Mild and Best Milds from a couple of breweries. Dead handy, because it helps show the relationship between the two at a brewery. It’s clear that Ordinary Mild was around 1032º while Best Mild was 1035º. And that Best Mild cost 1d per pint more.

The colours differed, too. Ordinary Mild was usually darker, though in the case Ramsdens and Websters – both Yorkshire breweries – the colour wasn’t that dark. I know from earlier Lees records that they had it the other way around, Ordinary Mild being pale and Best Mild dark. I think that was unusual. “The Pub and the People”, based on an investigation into Bolton puns in the late 1930’s, states that Ordinary Mild was dark and Best Mild pale. I tend to believe that was the usual relationship.

Having said that, about the only example of a brewery I personally experienced selling both Mild and Best Mild, Thwaites, had two dark beers.

Not much else to say, other than that Worthington’s Mild was pretty bad value. Mind you, beer from the famous Burton breweries sold at a premium price. Even their Mild. Oh, and there are very few really properly brown examples. I count that as 80 plus and only five examples hit that.

Provincial Ordinary Mild 1955 - 1959
Year	Brewer	Beer	Price per pint d	Acidity	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation	colour
1955	Hancock	Dark Malt			1032
1955	Hancock	XXXX			1031
1955	Lees	K			1030.0
1955	Thwaites	Mild Ale	16	0.06	1032.2	1006.1	3.39	81.06%	40
1955	Younger, Wm.	X	14		1030.2				96
1956	Lees	Mild			1031.0
1957	Lees	Mild			1032.0
1958	Home Brewery	Mild Ale		0.06	1034.5	1007.6	3.49	77.97%	60
1958	Lees	Mild			1032.0
1958	Scarsdale	Mild Ale		0.05	1035.4	1006.6	3.74	81.36%	130
1958	Vaux & Co	Mild Ale	15	0.04	1030.3	1005.8	3.18	80.86%	27
1959	Bentleys	Mild	13	0.04	1032.9	1005.4	3.44	83.59%	30
1959	Bents	Mild Ale	12	0.04	1033.2	1003.6	3.86	89.16%	55
1959	Chester Northgate Brewery Ltd	Mild Ale	14	0.07	1030.6	1005.6	3.25	81.70%	95
1959	Greenall Whitley	Mild Ale	12	0.04	1030.4	1005.5	3.23	81.91%	80
1959	Lees	Mild			1032.0
1959	Ramsdens	Mild	12	0.05	1029.2	1004.7	3.06	83.90%	45
1959	Threlfalls	Mild Ale	12	0.05	1032.8	1004.3	3.71	86.89%	50
1959	Websters	Mild	12	0.05	1031.6	1004.8	3.35	84.81%	55
	average		13.2	0.05	1031.8	1005.5	3.43	83.02%	63.6
Sources:
Lees brewing records held at the brewery.
“Cardiff Pubs and Breweries” by Brian Glover, 2005. pages 97-101
Truman Gravity Book held at the London Metropolitan Archives, document number B/THB/C/252
Whitbread Gravity book held at the London Metropolitan Archives, document number LMA/4453/D/02/002.

Provincial Best Mild 1955 - 1959
Year	Brewer	Beer	Price per pint d	Acidity	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation	colour
1955	Lees	Best Mild			1035.0
1955	Lees	Bot. B			1035.0
1955	Worthington	Special Mild Ale	19	0.04	1036.9	1007.9	3.77	78.59%	85
1956	Lees	Best Mild			1035.0
1956	Lees	Bottling Beer			1035.0
1957	Lees	Best Mild			1035.0
1958	Lees	Best Mild			1035.0
1959	Lees	Best Mild			1035.0
1959	Ramsdens	Best Mild	13	0.06	1035.5	1006.5	3.63	81.69%	35
1959	Websters	Best Mild	13	0.06	1035	1005.9	3.64	83.14%	20
1959	Whitaker	Best Mild	13	0.05	1033.1	1010.2	2.86	69.18%	45
	average		14.5	0.05	1035.0	1007.6	3.47	78.15%	46.3
Sources:
Lees brewing records held at the brewery.
Whitbread Gravity book held at the London Metropolitan Archives, document number LMA/4453/D/02/002.

And so we’re done. Maybe I should do something similar for Bitter.

UK beer exports 1946 – 1960

Numbers warning. There are lots and lots of numbers coming up. Why? I have them, so I’m going to use them.

There’s another good reason. Because they show the shift of British exports from the Empire to other markets. In particular, to Belgium.

The table is so big I’ve had to split in in two.

UK beer exports 1946 - 1953
destination	1946	1947	1948	1949	1950	1951	1952	1953
Channel Islands	5,342	7,021	9,958	9,693	6,505	2,721	8,959	9,815
Gibraltar	5,698	7,077	6,958	7,609	8,530	8,693	8,183	8,325
Malta	414	521	673	897	336	624	445	484
Cyprus		2,593	2,312	2,112	2,538	4,002	2,712	2,099
British West Africa	1,574	5,797	18,044	34,626	33,811	35,593	50,636	58,049
British East Africa	1,361	2,624	7,316	13,391	4,014	4,341	1,900	1,511
Aden	50	1,284	2,327	4,200	2,684	2,006	2,897	5,927
Bahrein, Koweit, etc		594	5,141	7,813	4,099	4,039	5,073	4,756
India and Pakistan	69,278	8,130	17,075	18,076	15,333	11,890	9,451	5,617
British Malaya	26,270	6,377	10,463	12,258	11,666	14,412	6,028	5,447
Ceylon	2,648	7,686	3,565	6,669	6,363	5,605	5,656	8,624
Hong Kong	10,062	5,873	5,679	12,863	9,508	12,027	7,254	4,811
Australia		54	8,481	18,761	16,879	35,790	8,303	57
Canada		313	1,598	1,281	2,090	3,352	3,680	3,892
Bermuda	22	788	977	1,603	2,843	1,901	1,466	948
British West India Islands	251	1,045	15,087	14,009	15,459	15,213	16,112	17,123
British Guiana	38	175	1,991	2,752	3,871	3,247	6,056	6,594
Anglo-Egyptian Sudan		1,843	3,069	5,747	5,291	6,805	6,277	3,035
Irish Republic	221	3,280	11,327	6,201	4,225	5,223	4,966	4,674
Other British Countries	74	972	6,470	6,719	7,153	8,927	10,260	6,570
total British	123,303	64,047	138,511	187,280	163,198	186,411	166,314	158,358
Belgium	1,405	3,414	34,288	33,786	33,362	45,733	50,237	55,240
other non-Commonwealth	62,710	42,219	32,299	33,061	24,650	43,289	50,839	71,341
total foreign	64,115	45,633	66,587	66,847	58,012	89,022	101,076	126,581
total	187,418	109,680	205,098	254,127	221,210	275,433	267,390	284,939
Source:
“1955 Brewers' Almanack”, pages 58-59.

UK beer exports 1954 - 1960
destination	1954	1955	1956	1957	1958	1959	1960
Channel Islands	11,307	11,486	12,505	14,301	16,006
Gibraltar	9,648	9,147	8,291	9,110	8,552	8,243	8,440
Malta	353	344	2,220	1,778	2,366	1,684	2,119
Cyprus	1,965	3,241	10,712	8,700	20,965	14,048	9,200
British West Africa	38,051	46,050	47,811	44,705	30,079	16,656	11,928
British East Africa	1,602	639	874	929	1,243	2,044	832
Aden	5,271	4,240	5,944	5,250	8,071	7,189	10,496
Bahrein, Koweit, etc	4,691	6,176	5,714	6,227	6,686	8,608	10,092
India and Pakistan	5,347	4,625	4,961	1,518	746	889	1,262
British Malaya	3,862	3,891	2,811	2,689	3,435	4,996	6,172
Ceylon	1,938	2,425	2,574	2,534	2,307	1,638	1,306
Hong Kong	3,975	2,738	2,074	2,239	2,108	1,862	1,516
Australia	58	16	3	11	88	158	141
Canada	3,674	3,992	3,785	4,041	4,657	4,420	5,452
Bermuda	1,098	1,034	1,136	890	990	920	941
British West India Islands	15,904	18,730	20,806	21,416	20,953	19,618	16,493
British Guiana	6,809	8,565	6,273	5,680	2,414	2,527	4,347
Anglo-Egyptian Sudan	1,853	1,213	199	*	*	*	*
Irish Republic	6,251	8,450	7,300	7,039	5,684	6,394	6,589
Other British Countries	6,234	5,127	4,751	7,350	8,174	5,848	5,285
total	129,891	142,129	150,744	146,407	145,524	107,742	102,611
Belgium	59,006	56,346	62,776	71,507	86,318	88,077	100,200
other non-Commonwealth	59,127	26,938	25,357	21,475	16,843	17,536	19,682
total foreign	118,133	83,284	88,133	92,982	103,161	105,613	119,882
total	248,024	225,413	238,877	239,389	248,685	213,355	222,493
Source:
“1962 Brewers' Almanack”, pages 56-57.

I’m surprised at how well exports held up after WW II. Peaking in 1953 at 284,000 barrels, before sliding back to 222,000 barrels at the end of the decade. Exports were also at a similar level to before the war:

UK beer exports 1934 - 1939
1934	1935	1936	1937	1938	1939
216,293	232,839	325,058	340,757	281,284	283,974
Source:
Brewers' Almanack 1955, p. 57

But there was a steady increase in the percentage exported to non-British territories after 1950:

UK exports to foreign countries
1946	1947	1948	1949	1950	1951	1952	1953
34.21%	41.61%	32.47%	26.30%	26.22%	32.32%	37.80%	44.42%
1954	1955	1956	1957	1958	1959	1960
47.63%	36.95%	36.89%	38.84%	41.48%	49.50%	53.88%

As the percentage increased so did the amount exported to Belgium, which by 1960 was received almost 50% of all UK exports. No wonder there are so many analyses of beer sold in Belgium in the Whitbread Gravity Book. Whitbread were big exporters so the Belgian market would have been very important for them.

The biggest falls are in regions from which the UK was withdrawing, such as Africa, India. The numbers are pretty steady in the Caribbean where the UK hadn’t started granting independence. Some of the reduction is probably due to the departure of British troops and administrators.

There must be something behind the sudden slump in exports to Australia. Probably some sort of legislation or import tax.

It’s interesting to note that most other places whose relationship with the UK remained much the same – Gibraltar, Channel Islands, Malta, Bermuda and Canada – exports remained stable or grew. Which confirms to me that the drop in exports to some countries was mostly due to changes in the political situation.

Next: which export destination paid the most per barrel.