Dutch brewing giant Heineken will buy a majority stake in brewers in South Africa and Namibia, companies said yesterday, creating a booze behemoth in a region currently dominated by rival Anheuser-Busch InBev.

Heineken plans to acquire South Africa’s Distell and Namibia Breweries in a combined deal valued at around $4.6 billion (€4 billion).

“We are very excited to bring together three strong businesses to create a regional beverage champion, perfectly positioned to capture significant growth opportunities in Southern Africa,” said Heineken’s CEO Dolf van den Brink in a statement.

Distell CEO Richard Rushton sees the deal as having “the potential to leverage the strength of Heineken’s global footprint with our leading brands to create a formidable, diverse beverage company for Africa”. 

Amsterdam-based Heineken is the world’s number two brewer behind Belgian-Brazilian giant AB InBev.

In 2016, AB InBev took over South African Breweries as part of a blockbuster SABMiller buyout, and enjoys an estimated 80 per cent of the beer market by volume in South Africa.