# Guinea-Bissau

Country page of DA Caps, a collection of beer bottle caps. Web page: https://dacaps.imcoll.info/country/gw/info

- Official name: Republic of Guinea-Bissau
- Local name: República da Guiné-Bissau
- Caps in the collection: 1 (https://dacaps.imcoll.info/country_caps/153)
- Brands: 1

## Beer in Guinea-Bissau

Guinea-Bissau drank before it brewed. Palm wine, the fermented sap of palm trees, still goes with weddings, funerals and other gatherings, and canjira, also called vinho de caju, is made from fermented cashew juice. Until independence the beer in Bissau was brought in, mostly from Portugal, and in 2011 the Portuguese Cristal still led in the town's cafés and bars.

The first brewery was CICER, Companhia Industrial de Cervejas e Refrigerantes da Guiné, built in Bissau with Portuguese money at the end of colonial rule. The Portuguese Wikipedia dates it to 1973, soon after the unilateral declaration of independence, and names the Portuguese businessman Cardoso e Cunha as its founder; VOA says Portuguese investors founded it at independence in 1974. It brewed Pampa, a 5.1% lager, and made soft drinks and water. In 1977, under a special agreement between Portugal and Guinea-Bissau, the Portuguese state brewer Central de Cervejas took a share in CICER; VOA adds that the company was nationalised and sold to Guineans a few years after independence, and then changed hands several times. In 1995 the Portuguese firm Faremi fitted stainless-steel pipework in the plant. Before the civil war Pampa sold about 5 million litres a year. Central de Cervejas sold its share in 1998, and VOA says the company shut that year, when the economy collapsed after the two-year war; the Portuguese Wikipedia gives 2001.

The brewery came back under Moroccan owners. According to the Portuguese Wikipedia, the Africa Bottling Company, or ABC Nova Cicer, bought it for 2 million US dollars in 2006 and started it after repairs in 2007, adding juices, milk and yoghurt to beer and soft drinks. VOA dates the purchase to the end of 2010, by investors under the name Holding ABC, and the restart of Pampa to March 2011. The plant drew its water from a well 160 metres deep and imported about 90 per cent of its inputs: malt came from Belgium by way of Portugal, with sugar, bottles, caps and cartons. The goal for 2011 was 3 million litres and 10 per cent more every year, in a market of 15 to 20 million litres.

The present owner is the Spanish Grupo Santy, a family business founded in 1960 in Equatorial Guinea. Its head, Santiago Hanna, said in 2021 that the group had come to Guinea-Bissau in 2006 with water bottling and began large investments in 2011. In November 2018 he told Lusa that Santy had bought CICER in 2016, that it had been idle since the 1990s, and that rebuilding, worth 25 million euros, had begun the week before. The plant was to brew Djumbai, which he called the only Guinean brand, for Guinea-Bissau and its neighbours, and to make water, soft drinks and juices. Djumbai, a 5.4% pale lager, is listed on Untappd under Comercial Santy of Bissau with a second beer, Pepita La Fresca, and drinkers were still logging it in September 2026. No opening of the rebuilt plant has been reported. The Brookston Beer Bulletin counts one brewery in the country and puts beer at only 7% of the alcohol drunk, 0.24 litres of pure alcohol a head a year.

Sources:
- [Wikipedia (pt): Africa Bottling Company Lda](https://pt.wikipedia.org/wiki/Africa_Bottling_Company_Lda)
- [VOA Português: Cerveja Pampa regressou à Guiné-Bissau (2011)](https://www.voaportugues.com/a/article-06-14-2011-guinebissaubeer-voanews-123831999/1260482.html)
- [Roines XXI (Sapo): Guiné - cerveja e água mineral (2018)](https://roinesxxi.blogs.sapo.pt/guine-cerveja-e-agua-mineral-1543133)
- [Central de Cervejas (SCC): Our history](https://www.centralcervejas.pt/en/about-us/history/)
- [Faremi: CICER - Fábrica de Cerveja Guiné (1995)](https://faremi.com/work/cicer-fabrica-de-cerveja-guine/)
- [Diário de Notícias (Lusa): Grupo espanhol adquire CICER, única cervejeira da Guiné-Bissau (2018)](https://www.dn.pt/lusa/grupo-espanhol-adquire-cicer-unica-cervejeira-da-guine-bissau-10137045.html)
- [ANG: Grupo Santy vai abrir novo supermercado em Bissau (2021)](http://angnoticias.blogspot.com/2021/03/comercio-grupo-santy-vai-abrir-novo.html)
- [Comercial Santy: Início](https://comercialsanty.com)
- [Untappd: Comercial Santy](https://untappd.com/w/comercial-santy/390241)
- [Untappd: Djumbai](https://untappd.com/b/comercial-santy-djumbai/2165187)
- [Brewver: Comercial Santy](https://brewver.com/breweries/8760/Comercial-Santy)
- [Brookston Beer Bulletin: Guinea-Bissau Beer](https://brookstonbeerbulletin.com/guinea-bissau-beer/)
- [Wikipedia: Bissau-Guinean cuisine](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bissau-Guinean_cuisine)
- [Wikipedia: Portuguese Guinea](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portuguese_Guinea)
- [Archontology: Guinea-Bissau, Polity Style 1973-2026](https://archontology.org/nations/guinea_bissau/01_polity.php)

## Breweries (1)

- [CEM Bissau S.A.](https://dacaps.imcoll.info/brewery/3747.md) — 1 cap, 1974–