INCREASED CONSUMPTION OF ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGES IN CANADA.

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Volume XVIII, Issue 1022, 7 October 1909, Page 22

INCREASED CONSUMPTION OF ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGES IN CANADA.

A writer in the New York Medical Journal,, taking as a basis the report of the Excise Division on the Department of Internal Revenue of Canada, declares that in spite of the local option movement the production of alcoholic beverages continues to grow in the Dominion. While the consumption of spirits per capita has decreased in forty years, the consumption of malt liquors a head has more than doubled. More tobacco is being consumed, especially in the form of cigarettes. The writer says:

“ Spirits, of course, are not all consumed as beverages, large quantities been used in the preparation of medicines and in some of the industrial arts, though for the latter wood spirit is to some extent taking the place of the article made from grain. The greater part of the alcohol made from grain or molasses is intended, however, for beverages. “In Canada last year the new output of the distillers was at the record figure of 6,849,763 proof gallons, there being consumed in the process 7,679,000 pounds of malt, 72,997,000 pounds of Indian corn, 14,921,000 pounds of rye, 3,117,000 pounds of wheat, 395,000 pounds of oats, and 17,212,000 pounds of molasses. In the matter of production, Ontario is the great whisky province. It has within its bounds seven of the twelve distilleries in Canada. The increased production of spirits is small compared with the growth in the output of beer. “ Many regard the increase in the consumption of malt liquor as a temperance movement, and they have some reason, as it is well known there is less temptation to indulge to unseemly excess in drinking ales and beer than when consuming the highly intoxicating spirituous beverages. When the records are gone back to, the figures speak for themselves. In 1869 the consumption of spirits, home made and imported, was 1.124 gallons a head. In the same time the quantity of beer consumed has risen from 2.290 gallons a head to 5.812 gallons.”