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Topic: Beer Festivals

Does Taiwan have Beer Festivals?

Not observed here

Taiwan has no official beer festival. The Act on Commemorative Days and Holidays contains nothing of the kind, and the events that carry the name are dates chosen by a city government or a private organiser, with the central government taking no part. What is distinctive in Taiwan lies elsewhere: alcohol here used to be a state monopoly good. The Provisional Regulations on the Tobacco and Alcohol Monopoly within Taiwan Province were repealed only on 22 May 2002. The Tobacco and Alcohol Administration Act that replaced them defines alcohol as any beverage exceeding 0.5 per cent alcohol by volume, and names the Ministry of Finance as the competent authority at central level and the municipal government at special-municipality level. Article 30 of the same Act forbids selling alcohol through vending machines, mail order, electronic shopping or any other channel where the buyer's age cannot be identified; Article 32 requires packaged alcohol to carry the warning "excessive drinking harms health" or an equivalent. While a Brazilian city government stages a festival, Taiwan's central government only stepped out of the business of selling the drink itself a little over twenty years ago.

What is this topic?

The same German festival, exported, and the decisive difference is where the state stands. Brazil's Oktoberfest in Blumenau is run by the city itself — the venue is listed among the municipal organs. China's Qingdao International Beer Festival is run by the municipal government and falls in July and August, not October, tracing back to a brewery German and British merchants built in Qingdao in 1903. In the United States the Cincinnati festival is privately run and the state's only role is a temporary liquor permit that by law may not be issued for private gain. In Indonesia, alcohol control means the event does not exist at all.

Sources and dates

Dates follow local time zones, calendars, and official notices. Check the source when a date is estimated or locally variable.