Rum consultant, and World Rum Awards chair of judges, Peter Holland agrees that the rum industry has some repositioning to do. “A problem that we have in the rum world is that it’s represented invariably by price, and that price is low,” he says. “When you race to the bottom you’re not really driving up quality.”

Thus, Mr Holland’s passion lies in re-educating the market about rum. He feels it is a spirit that has enormous potential, and a level of complexity – attained through different distillation and aging techniques – that is currently not well marketed or understood.

As Queensland is a big grower of sugar cane, Mt Uncle has a ready source of sugar syrup from which to make its rum. In fact, Mr Watkins’ family farm in Walkamin, which is home to Mt Uncle Distillery, is right next to a sugar mill.

For rum producers in cooler countries where sugarcane cannot be grown, they typically rely on easily transportable and readily available molasses. This is the case at the UK’s Two Drifters Rum.

Located outside the city of Exeter in the south west of England, the company is run by husband and wife team Russ and Gemma Wakeham.

They started out making beer in 2019, with a small distillery on the side “for a bit of fun” but have now switched to solely making rum.

“It was completely driven by the fact that we couldn’t make enough of it,” says Russ.