This week on Beer is a Conversation we meet Dr Ron Beatson.

It’s not many people who get to have the impact on a country’s industry that Ron has had on the hops industry in New Zealand. His research has been credited as having transformed NZ Hops from a cottage industry supplying hops to NZ-based brewers to a sophisticated export product with more than 85% of production now exported to the some of the world’s leading beer producing nations.

In Nectaron he has also had a hop named after him.

I was in Nelson for the first time and had the chance to speak with Dr Beatson about a career that saw him move from research into tobacco into hops, what he loves about the industry and also where he sees hops and hop research going.

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