By Northern countries, the OP meant not just Russia but also countries like the UK and Scandinavia.
In Spain the calculation is “drinks taxed/inhabitants”. While not everybody who ever buys a bottle of whisky or a six-pack in Spain is going to live in Spain, not every drink taken by someone who lives in Spain is taken in Spain either, so in theory it should compensate.
No, no. It’s the Koreans who move to L.A. who open an Eat & Shop.
That still leaves United Kingdom, Ireland, Finland and Denmark higher than Italy (and Greece), as Mediterranean countries, so the WHO data wouldn’t justify use of the term “myth” with regard to the OP’s question. I agree, however, that some of the more common stereotypes aren’t completely born out by this list–there are some strange outliers. For example, Azerbaijan, Seychelles and Gabon, which are big beer drinking countries almost in the same league as Ireland, Austria and Germany (no one seems to come close to the Czech Republic when it comes to beer). I just kind of assumed that all the hot, tropical countries would be high in beer as percentage of total, but that’s not the case, and neither is it explained by the countries’ wealth in the case of these two. It could be that, in the case of Azerbaijan, for example, that there happens to be a lot of beer production there for other reasons, so beer is just cheap.
MichaelEMouse, I present to you the Vodka Belt.
In the article Alcohol Belts of Europe is this analysis that sheds some light on your OP question.
"The southern boundary of the ‘vodka belt’ roughly corresponds to -2°C January isotherm. With the exception of Ukraine and some regions of southern Russia, cultivation of grapes is impossible or very difficult in the Vodka belt.
In his book about the Soviet Union, Alex de Jonge elaborates on his concept of ‘geoalcoholics’. In particular, he explains Russian peculiarities by their belonging to the vodka belt and the absence of the beer belt in the Soviet Union. Other than the prevalent hard liquor, the vodka belt is also characteristic of higher occurrence binge drinking pattern compared to the rest of Europe."
It can get politicized, seriously: The Polish Beer Lovers’ Party won 16 seats in the Sejm. They blame wódka (pronounced VOOT-ka) for alcoholism and want more English-style pubs.
The map accompanying the article attributes to Azerbaijan a half-hearted taste for vodka, but no beer there. Cartography fail?
Scandinavia is not country, Russia is as much southern as northern…
I kind of suspect that that’s probably an error in the Wiki reporting of the WHO data. Maybe it’s produced there and exported, though.
The map also seems to indicate only one area where beer, wine, and vodka all overlap: in the southeast corner of Poland, from Kraków east and south to the borders, in the region known as Lesser Poland. Can anyone vouch for the triple overlap there?
And if you get beer in France, the domestic brews are always “bière d’Alsace.” But the map has Alsace-Lorraine down as wine-only. Why not a beer/wine overlap?
I’m originally from Denmark. Danes claim to be happy but they are not so they drink to forget why they are unhappy. It’s such a boring homogenous society and alcohol gives you an excuse to let your hair down and act stupid.