Portugal leading world wine consumption

My wife and I just spent a very nice week as tourists in the south of Portugal. Portugal is a relatively small country, but it does produce quite a fair amount of wine (10th in the world, and 5th in Europe). One other thing that cannot be missed is the amount of wine that is being drunk, per person. So, this is worth looking at in a blog post.

First, let us look at the actual data. This map shows the amount of wine consumed per person per year for each country (from Wine consumption by country).

As you can see, Portugal is seriously high. It is therefore worth looking at the actual numbers, which we can do in this table (from the same source). As you can see, Portugal is number 2 in the world, at 52 liters per person (ie. 1 liter per week).

What my wife and I noticed during our trip is that almost every person in every restaurant was drinking wine, at both lunch and dinner time. That is, most of the adult population was consuming wine every day.

After all, Portugal has a long tradition of drinking wine — it is normal to treat food and wine as closely connected (unlike, say, beer). So, it is normal to see the same people drinking a glass of wine at both lunch and dinner; and also to see people eating on their own, drinking wine normally. There is also so much wine available, and it is certainly not expensive. Many vines were planted following the devastating earthquake of the 1700s (1755 Lisbon earthquake), after which the area around Porto was also protected. Similarly, the Anglo-French Wars of that same period led to the planting of lots of cultivars in the Portuguese vineyards. Availability leads to cultural habits.

This wine-drinking cultural situation is not necessarily so in the English-speaking world. Unlike mainland Europe, where wine has long been part of the culture, it has not been the case in Britain, especially during the challenging post-WWII years. Moreover, The World Health Organization decreed in 2023 that alcohol is not safe for consumption (No level of alcohol consumption is safe for our health); and the public is continually fed a media diet of health warnings (Can the beverage industry stand united amid anti-alcohol animosity on multiple fronts?). I have previously discussed the fact that neither of these latter viewpoints is justified (e.g. Another official study indicating that alcohol is not necessarily a risk for cancer).

It is worth noting that there has previously also been high individual consumption of wine for some nations. If we consider Consumption of wine, beer and spirits in 1899, then we can note that the French apparently consumed 112 liters of wine per head, which is a third of a liter per day. This makes the modern Portuguese look mild!