Oxfordshire's newest brewery, White Horse, based in Stanford in the Vale, had cause for a double celebration recently. Only weeks after it was launched, the brewery's first beer, Oxfordshire Bitter, won two prestigious awards.

The Society of Independent Brewers (SIBA) holds regular regional contests to find the best beers brewed by independent breweries, and White Horse came up trumps in the Midlands competition held at Nottingham Beer Festival. A panel of experts proclaimed it to be the best beer in its class and the best overall, beating off rivals from many larger and longer-established brewers. SIBA is a trade and consumer organisation, whose main aim is "to campaign on behalf of craft brewers to ensure that they have the best possible opportunity to bring their goods to the market."

SIBA and CAMRA's aims are obviously very close. Like CAMRA, SIBA has campaigned hard for guest beer rights, changes to progressive beer duty and has worked with pub companies to persuade them to support smaller breweries and their beers. SIBA is also a trade association, and it brings together brewers and a range of suppliers who cover everything including raw material supply and other essentials of the brewing trade.

The importance of SIBA puts into perspective the significance of the award that Andy Wilson and Ian Rogers' beer has just won. You can find the beer around several pubs in Oxford, including the Turf Tavern, Far from the Madding Crowd, the Radcliffe Arms in Jericho, and, not surprisingly, the White Horse on Broad Street.

So what was the other award the beer scooped? Well, early visitors to the Oxford Beer Festival were also able to taste the beer (the first barrel of it ran out after just a few hours, and our second followed not long afterwards), and, not surprisingly, they voted it to be the Beer of the Festival by some considerable margin. Not a bad start, then.