# Zimbabwe

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

- Official name: Republic of Zimbabwe
- Local name: Nyika yeZimbabwe
- Caps in the collection: 5 (https://dacaps.imcoll.info/country_caps/65)
- Brands: 4

## Beer in Zimbabwe

Beer in Zimbabwe is older than the country. Sorghum, finger millet and pearl millet have been grown here for centuries, and women brewed them into a thick sour beer for family feasts, spirit rites and royal hospitality. European brewing came with the settlers: the foundation stone of the Salisbury Lager & Beer Company was laid in Cameroon Street, Salisbury (now Harare), by Mayor Ernest Fairbridge on 30 August 1898, and it is counted as the country's first brewery. Delta's timeline records that Breweries Ltd, reconstructed after a liquidation in 1905, was bought by South African Breweries in May 1910 (SAB's own history says 1911), and that a rebuilt six-storey brewery opened in December 1911. A 1911 ordinance gave the city councils the monopoly of brewing and selling African beer, which kept the municipal beer halls, Salisbury's Liquor Undertaking and later Bulawayo's Ingwebu brewery, in that trade.

Rhodesian Breweries was registered in September 1946. Its Sable Brewery in Bulawayo opened on 30 October 1950 with pale ale, milk stout and Sable Lager; SAB bought a second Salisbury brewery in 1951 and agreed a merger scheme with the company in January 1952. The Southerton Brewery in Salisbury was opened on 2 February 1962 by the federal prime minister, Roy Welensky. That year Heinrich's Chibuku Breweries began to sell opaque sorghum beer in shaken cartons in Salisbury, against the council's monopoly, and in February 1967 the company, then called Rhobrew, bought a third of it. Castle and Lion Lager were relaunched in August 1968 and Carling Black Label came in June 1970. In April 1978 the group took the name Delta Corporation and became a holding company with supermarkets, hotels and bottling as well.

Delta kept its place after independence in 1980, opening a new brewhouse and bottling hall at Southerton in February 1993. Zambezi Export Lager, a premium brand pitched at tourists, was launched in May 1990 (Delta's product page says 1992), Eagle Lager came in September 2005 and Sable Lager was relaunched in March 2022. SABMiller was Delta's main shareholder, and since AB InBev bought it in 2016 AB InBev holds about 40 per cent; Delta bought Zambia's National Breweries in 2017 and South Africa's United National Breweries, owner of the Chibuku brand, in April 2020. Its lager business, long known as the National Breweries division, brews at Southerton in Harare and Belmont in Bulawayo, and the Chibuku division makes sorghum beer round the country. Delta is reported to hold about 95 per cent of lager sales and 86 per cent of traditional beer.

Outside Delta the trade is small. Ingwebu Breweries in Bulawayo, an opaque-beer maker owned by the city, was in crisis in July 2026: workers were owed about 16 months of pay and output had fallen by more than three quarters on a 1946 plant. Craft brewing began in Victoria Falls, where River Brewing Company and BeerBab opened in 2017. The food group Innscor set up the Buffalo Brewing Company in 2021 at Stapleford near Harare and launched its Nyathi sorghum beer in December 2022 to take on Chibuku.

Demand now runs ahead of supply. In the quarter to 30 June 2026 Delta's beverage volumes rose 14 per cent to about 3.4 million hectolitres and revenue 23 per cent to US$294.6 million; lager grew 17 per cent, and Delta topped it up with imports from sister companies in the region. Upgrades at Southerton were due to add capacity in the third quarter of its 2027 financial year, ahead of a US$35 million rebuild of the Belmont brewery in Bulawayo, with a new brewhouse and a second packaging line to take it to 1.5 million hectolitres a year, announced in October 2025.

Sources:
- [Delta Corporation: Our Historic Timeline](https://delta.co.zw/?p=4553)
- [Delta Corporation: Local Lager Brands](https://delta.co.zw/?p=4578)
- [Delta Corporation: Zambezi Lager](https://www.delta.co.zw/zambezi-lager/)
- [The Herald: Did you know? Delta Corporation Limited history (2020)](https://www.heraldonline.co.zw/did-you-know-delta-corporation-limited-history/)
- [The Herald: Delta posts 23pc revenue growth as first-quarter volumes jump 14pc (2026)](https://www.heraldonline.co.zw/5421073-2delta-posts-23pc-revenue-growth-as-first-quarter-volumes-jump-14pc/)
- [inside.beer: Zimbabwe: Delta invests USD 35 million in Bulawayo brewery upgrade (2025)](https://www.inside.beer/news/detail/zimbabwe-delta-invests-usd-35-million-in-bulawayo-brewery-upgrade)
- [Chimhete: Heinrich's Chibuku Breweries and the Informalization of the African Beer Industry in Salisbury, Rhodesia, 1962-1979, African Economic History (2023)](https://aeh.uwpress.org/content/51/1/48)
- [Pathisa Nyathi, The Chronicle: Traditional beer brewing, consumption: Past and present (2022)](https://www.heraldonline.co.zw/traditional-beer-brewing-consumption-past-and-present-part-1/)
- [Nehanda Radio: BCC weans off Ingwebu Breweries (2017)](https://nehandaradio.com/2017/10/05/bcc-weans-off-ingwebu-breweries/)
- [CITE: Ingwebu workers strike over unpaid salaries (2026)](https://cite.org.zw/?p=62852)
- [Funding Universe: The South African Breweries Limited History](https://www.fundinguniverse.com/company-histories/the-south-african-breweries-limited-history/)
- [The Insider: New brewery company for Zimbabwe (2022)](https://insiderzim.com/?p=47038)
- [Innscor Africa: The Buffalo Brewing Company](https://www.innscorafrica.com/brands/rutanhi-beverages/the-buffalo-brewing-company/)
- [Southern & East African Tourism Update: New beer varieties bring taste of Zim to tourists (2019)](https://www.tourismupdate.com/article/new-beer-varieties-bring-taste-of-zim-to-tourists)
- [BeerAdvocate: Delta Beverages, Harare](https://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/189/)
- [BeerAdvocate: The River Brewing Company, Victoria Falls](https://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/63952/)
- [Archontology: Rhodesia, Polity Style 1965-1979](https://www.archontology.org/nations/zimbabwe/01_polity1.php)
- [Archontology: Zimbabwe, Polity Style 1980-2026](https://www.archontology.org/nations/zimbabwe/01_polity2.php)
- [Wikipedia: Flag of Rhodesia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_of_Rhodesia)
- [Wikipedia: Southern Rhodesia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_Rhodesia)

## Breweries (2)

- [National Breweries Ltd.](https://dacaps.imcoll.info/brewery/1163.md) — 1 cap, 1898–
- [National Breweries Harare](https://dacaps.imcoll.info/brewery/5186.md) — 4 caps, 1898–