On December 14, 1897 Fernando Primo de Rivera , Captain General of the Philippines, signed the Biac-Na-Bató pact with Emilio Aguinaldo and Fany , leader of the Philippine insurgents. The pact forced the Spanish authorities to pay an amount of money to the insurgents and undertake certain reforms. For their part, the rebels promised to put an end to the armed struggle and their leaders to go into exile in Hong Kong. This agreement benefited both parties:the Spanish could focus on Cuba and the Filipinos took a break (internal disputes were undermining their "revolution"). Despite the signed agreement, the small skirmishes never ceased. The unfulfilled agreements irritated the exiles and they decided to use the compensation money to buy weapons and resume the fight... with the support of the US .
On June 2, 1899, what remained of the Spanish detachment of Baler surrendered, ending almost a year of siege... they were the last in the Philippines . After the recognition of their value and the reception as heroes in Manila, the survivors were repatriated to Spain. But they were not the last, in the neighborhood of San Miguel in Manila was the San Miguel brewery that Enrique María Barretto de Ycaza had founded 9 years earlier following the recipe of the Augustinian friars .
An agreement with the US Army allowed the businessman to continue brewing and export it to Shanghai, Hong Kong and Guam in 1903, becoming a pioneer in Asia and, to this day, still one of the most widely consumed. Halfway through the century, and after opening a factory in Hong Kong, they decide on the most difficult yet:“to be a prophet in his land”. To do this, a new factory is opened in Lleida where the knowledge of more than half a century of brewing, new technologies in the fermentation process and Asian yeast will be combined. Despite the recognition of his work in the form of international awards, San Miguel continues to innovate:in 2001 it launched the first non-alcoholic beer in Spain and in 2003 the first organic one. Today, and thanks to Heron of Alexandria , the inventor of the vending machine in the first century, you can have a very cold San Miguel anywhere in the world and at any time of the day.
Still… #YLoBestIsToCome