State of beer

This week, Sept. 11-14, the California Craft Brewers Association is holding its annual summit and beer fest in Long Beach. Three days of talks, demos and a trade show will be followed by a festival of beer tastings from more than 170 member breweries. As part of its advocacy, the organization keeps track of stats, and these are a few of the current numbers related to craft-brewing in California:

• There are 980 craft breweries in the state.

• Ninety-five percent of Californians live within 10 miles of a brewery.

• Craft beer employs 54,028 full-time workers.

• More than 3 million barrels of beer are brewed in the state annually.