Cervecería y Maltería Quilmes exported more than 970,000 tons of barley and malt worth over US$370 million in 2025, and this year it added the world's most populous country, India, to its buyer list.

The brewer sent two shipments of the cereal to India in 2025, according to the company. That addition rounds out a regional footprint that already includes Brazil, Peru, Ecuador, Colombia and Chile. For the current season, Quilmes plans to place roughly 600,000 tons of barley abroad plus between 220,000 and 330,000 tons of malt.

The push sits inside a broader surge in Argentine barley trade. A Grain Exchange report released by the Argentine Agroindustrial Council (CAA) puts grain barley exports at 1.96 million tons between January and March 2026 — a 67.3% jump against the same period a year earlier.

Where does the money sit?

In value terms, Argentina's external sales from the barley complex reached US$569.9 million in the first quarter of 2026, up 30.1% year on year. The sector accounted for 4.7% of the agro-industrial exports surveyed by the exchange.

The headline growth hides a split picture across the three product lines:

• Grain barley shipments rose 67.3% by volume.
• Malting barley (the higher-grade seed selected for brewing) fell 34.9%.
• Malt itself improved 11.4%, reaching 119,396 tons.

That mix matters commercially. Part of the harvest leaves the country as raw grain, and part goes through an industrial process first — steeping, germinating and kilning the barley — to become malt, one of the main inputs for beer. The transformation adds value to the raw material before it crosses the border, which is exactly the industrial link Quilmes controls at home.

How does Quilmes anchor the chain?

In Argentina, the company works with a network of more than 1,300 agricultural producers and moves production exceeding 1.2 million tons of barley through that chain. It also runs two malting plants in Buenos Aires province with a combined production capacity of 470,000 tons.

Expanding the list of commercial destinations is the point the company stresses most. Juan Mitjans, director of Public and Government Affairs for Quilmes in Argentina and Uruguay, told Clarín: "When we compare the variety of products and the alternatives that we have in Argentina with those of other countries in the region and the world, we see a very great potential."

What's behind the agronomy?

The export muscle rests on decades of crop science. Quilmes' research center in Tres Arroyos, in southern Buenos Aires province, has developed 20 barley varieties over more than 50 years, according to company data. Those varieties now cover roughly 70% of Argentina's planted barley area — a domesticated seed base that lets farmers plant barley bred for local soils and climate rather than imported genetics.

The numbers tell a simple strategic story. Argentina is shipping more raw grain and more malt to more countries, and India is the newest proof that demand extends well beyond the region. Quilmes sits at the center of that flow: it contracts the growers, breeds the seed, malts the barley and finds the buyers.

For an agro-industrial complex that represents 4.7% of measured agro-exports, a 30.1% rise in foreign sales value in a single quarter signals momentum. The question for the rest of 2026 is whether the malting barley decline — down 34.9% — proves a blip or a shift toward shipping more grain and finished malt instead.

Either way, the 1,300-producer network and the 470,000-ton malting capacity give Quilmes room to keep flexing the mix.