David --
   The World Drinks Trade gives only recorded sales.  This is understandable, since it is compiled by and for the legal alcohol industry, and since the recorded data are more readily available.  By now, there are at least point estimates of unrecorded consumption, too (for the countries of the EU before its enlargement, see: Leifman, H. Estimations of unrecorded alcohol consumption levels and trends in 14 European countries. Nordisk alkohol- & narkotikatidskrift (Nordic Studies on Alcohol and Drugs), 18(English Suppl.):54-70, 2001.)  If one takes those into account, Luxembourg drops a little (since about ½ litre per capita there is purchased for consumption outside Luxembourg), places like Sweden go up a little (about 2 litres pure alcohol per capita unrecorded), but place like Russia and much of eastern Europe go up a lot.  (Last time I looked, less than 1/5 of Ukrainian consumption was recorded.)  In the developing world, unrecorded consumption can be ~80% of all consumption (e.g., in east Africa -- see Justin Willis' book, among other places).  As of a few years ago, Moldava was top of the world list -- they have a lot of "ordinaire" wine dirt cheap, since they are relatively cut off from their former USSR markets. 
   An on-line source is the WHO Global Alcohol Database.  Again, it mostly gives recorded consumption.
   http://www3.who.int/whosis/menu.cfm?path=whosis,alcohol&language=english
   This is not on the country level, but I have patched in a table by WHO subregion on consumption in different parts of the world which includes estimated unrecorded consumption.  It is from R. Room et al., Alcohol in Developing Societies: A Public Health Approach.  Helsinki: Finnish Foundation for Alcohol Studies, 2002.  You will se that Eur-C is highest, once unrecorded is taken into account, but that the differences between regions of the world are much reduced when the calculation is on consumption per drinker, taking the abstainers out of the base. 
    Robin

Table 3.1  Estimated alcohol consumption per person aged 15+ in different regions of the world, for 2000  (litres of 100% ethanol per year, population weighted averages)

 

WHO Region

(Defined on next page)

Beverage type
mostly consumed

Recorded consumption

Unrecorded consumption

Total consumption

%  drinkers

Consumption per drinker

Afr D
 (e.g. Nigeria, Algeria)

 Mainly other fermented beverages

0.8

2.8

3.6

37

9.8

Afr E
 (e.g. Ethiopia, South Africa)

 Mainly other fermented  beverages and beer

3.8

3.3

7.1

43

16.5

Amr A
(Canada, Cuba, US)

 > 50% of consumption is beer, about 25% spirits

8.6

1.1

9.7

65

14.8

Amr B
(e.g. Brazil, Mexico)

 Beer,
followed by spirits

6.1

2.5

8.6

64

13.5

Amr D
(e.g. Bolivia, Peru)

Spirits, followed by beer

4.5

1.3

5.8

67

8.7

Emr B
(e.g. Iran, Saudi Arabia)

 Spirits and beer, but scarce data

0.6

0.5

1.1

11

9.7

Emr D
(e.g. Afghanistan, Pakistan)

 Spirits and beer, but scarce data

0.4

0.4

0.8

9

8.3

Eur A
(e.g. Germany, France, UK)

Wine and beer

11.7

1.3

13.0

85

15.3

Eur B 1
(e.g. Bulgaria, Poland, Turkey)

Spirits

6.5

3.2

9.7

67

14.4

Eur B 2
(e.g. Armenia, Azerbajan, Tajikistan)

Spirits and wine

2.2

2.1

4.3

43

9.9

Eur C
(e.g. Russian Federation, Ukraine)

Spirits

9.4

5.4

14.8

85

17.5

Sear B
(e.g. Indonesia,Thailand)

Spirits

2.1

1.2

3.3

22

14.9

Sear D
(e.g. Bangladesh, India)

Spirits

0.4

1.6

2.0

16

12.9

Wpr A
(e.g. Australia, Japan)

Beer and spirits

7.0

1.7

8.7

82

10.5

Wpr B
(e.g. China, Philippines, Viet Nam)

Spirits

3.6

1.3

4.9

55

8.9

 

Source: Jürgen  Rehm (May 2001), based on estimates for the WHO Comparative Risk Analysis within the Global Burden of Disease 2000 Study.  See next page for explanations.

 

Table 3.1 (continued)

 

                All consumption levels are in litres of absolute alcohol per resident of the region aged 15 and over.  Recorded consumption is derived from official or industry figures; unrecorded consumption is estimated from a variety of sources.  The percentage of drinkers (drinking at all in the last 12 months) in this table averages the estimated percentages for males and females; these are derived from population surveys, where possible.  Where figures for a country were otherwise unavailable, they were extrapolated from nearby countries on the basis of similarity of alcohol culture.

                The regional subgroupings below have been defined by WHO on the basis of high, medium or low levels of adult and of infant mortality.  WHO’s EUR B has been subdivided to separate out the relatively low-consumption southern republics of the former Soviet Union.   

                   

15 Regions:            191 WHO Member States (defined by geographical location and mortality pattern):

 

Afr

D

Algeria, Angola, Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Cape Verde, Chad, Comoros, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Madagascar, Mali, Mauritania, Mauritius, Niger, Nigeria, Sao Tome and Principe, Senegal, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, Togo

Afr

E

Botswana, Burundi, Central African Republic, Congo, Côte d'Ivoire, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Rwanda, South Africa, Swaziland, Uganda, United Republic of Tanzania, Zambia, Zimbabwe

Amr

A

Canada, Cuba, United States of America

Amr

B

Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominica, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Grenada, Guyana, Honduras, Jamaica, Mexico, Panama, Paraguay, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago, Uruguay, Venezuela

Amr

D

Bolivia, Ecuador, Guatemala, Haiti, Nicaragua, Peru

Emr

B

Bahrain, Cyprus, Iran (Islamic Republic of), Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syrian Arab Republic, Tunisia, United Arab Emirates

Emr

D

Afghanistan, Djibouti, Egypt, Iraq, Morocco, Pakistan, Somalia, Sudan, Yemen

Eur

A

Andorra, Austria, Belgium, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Luxembourg, Malta, Monaco, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, San Marino,  Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom

Eur

B 1

Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Georgia, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, The Former Yugoslav Republic Of Macedonia, Turkey, Yugoslavia

Eur

B 2

Armenia, Azerbaijan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan

Eur

C

Belarus, Estonia, Hungary, Kazakhstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Republic of Moldova, Russian Federation, Ukraine

Sear

B

Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Thailand

Sear

D

Bangladesh, Bhutan, Democratic People's Republic of Korea, India, Maldives, Myanmar, Nepal

Wpr

A

Australia, Brunei Darussalam, Japan, New Zealand, Singapore

Wpr

B

Cambodia, China, Cook Islands, Fiji, Kiribati, Lao People's Democratic Republic, Malaysia, Marshall Islands, Micronesia (Federated States of), Mongolia, Nauru, Niue, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, Republic of Korea, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu, Vanuatu, Viet Nam

-----Original Message-----
From: Alcohol and Drugs History Society
[mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf Of David Fahey
Sent: Tuesday, January 04, 2005 9:34 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: world's most bibulous countries


Under this heading, the Atlantic (Dec. 04) offered a short article or
listing.

Drawing on data from the World Drinks Trade 2004 (a British
publication), the article listed the top ten consuming countries (from
1st to 10th):

Luxembourg
Hungary
Czech Republic
Ireland
Germany
France
Portugal
Spain
Great Britain
Denmark

Russia ranked 15th overall but 1st in spirits consumption.  Russia
consumed relatively little beer and wine.

The USA was 26th among the 45 countries that were ranked.  The USA
consumed relatively little wine and spirits.

The precise criteria were left unclear, but there are graphic
representations of the different forms of alcohol that each of the top
ten country consumed.

For me, the main surprise was that the Czech Republic wasn't listed
first in per capita consumption of alcoholic drinks.

I wonder what the rankings would be for consumption of various illegal
drugs.

Speaking of illegality, Sweden (I am told) consumes much of its alcohol
either from illegal sources or legal homebrew, so official Swedish
statistics are misleadingly low.

Of course, none of these statistics indicate whether the drink
consumption is concentrated in just part of the publication (as in the
Irish Republic, where many people are abstainers or nearly so) or
whether the drinking in spread across the day and the calendar or takes
the form of sprees (as among young adult males in Finland).

In other words, statistics conceal as much as they reveal.