From: Cayman Net News:

The Cayman Islands Brewery (CIB) has been awarded a top international accolade for beer quality with their product Caybrew.

The Brewery entered the beer into the Monde Selection Awards 2008, (International Institute for Quality Selections) an internationally recognised and leading global standard, and the beer came out on top with a gold medal. In order to achieve this award those entering must achieve very high standards which is why Oliver Wesseloh, CIB?s Technical Manager was so delighted with the gold medal.

?This is such an important award for us to have received and it confirms the quality of Caybrew beyond doubt. We at CIB knew we had created a high quality beer and the people of Cayman knew they had a great beer, but now the world knows we have a great beer,? he said.

?This really does mean a lot to us and it underscores the fact that Caybrew really is an exceptional product.?

The quality and taste of Caybrew has been extremely important to CIB from the very beginning. The team always sought to create a top quality beer for the islands. The beer that would stand up on the market as a premium product and one the islands could be proud of, the CIB said.

The beer is described as a refreshingly smooth, full-bodied premium lager, with a crisp, clean hop character and because it is brewed here on island it is an exceptionally fresh product.

Mr Wesseloh explained that the intention was to create a beer that would suit the local climate, be easy to drink and at the same time have a full bodied taste.

?We wanted to create a beer that would go down easily but that had a full flavour with an acceptable alcohol content,? he said.

The beer is a fusion of the best European ingredients blended with a touch of the Caribbean. Mr Wesseloh said that the ingredients used in Caybrew are some of the best in the world, which he says contributed in no small measure to achieving a gold medal.

Although the CIB is small compared to other breweries around the world, it is a state of the art facility, which has helped the team create this award winning beer and then, most importantly of all, maintain its quality. This award clearly justifies the investment in the superior facilities, according to a press release from the company.

?Winning such an important international industry accolade and getting the recognition the product deserves is wonderful,? said Allen Chu Fook, the brewery?s General Manager.

?We are incredibly proud to have received this medal and we congratulate our technical team for making such an outstanding beer. Moreover, it underlines our commitment towards maintaining the quality of Caybrew and providing our customers with the best and freshest beer on islands.?

Having opened the brewery in March 2007, to have gained this international industry recognition so quickly speaks volumes for the quality of Caybrew and the standards of production at the brewery, the CIB said in a press release.

With outstanding green credentials for its recycling or bottles and the water used in the brewing process, CIB is also demonstrating that being a good corporate citizen pays dividends in many ways.

?Caybrew?s new piece of branding, ?Made Fresh Made Local? is likened to a quality seal of approval which will now accompany all advertising of Caybrew to reflect the local beer?s uniqueness to Cayman,? Mr Chu Fook said. ?The Gold medal for quality now adds to the recognition that Caybrew is a high quality fresh beer and it is brewed right here in Cayman, locally.?

Monde Selection is an Independent International Institute founded in 1961 on a Belgian initiative in Brussels. It is the oldest and most representative organization in the field of Quality Selections in the world.

Each year an average of over 1,500 products are presented to the Institute from more than 70 different countries in order to assess their quality standards an.

The mission of the organisation is to assess and ascertain over time the quality of worldwide products. It considers a number of criteria including organoleptic tasting, labelling, conformity verification and laboratory analysis.