São Paulo – Exports by Brazilian agribusiness to the Arab countries fetched more than US$ 900 million in July, an increase of 2.1% over the same month of last year. In all, 1.8 million tons were shipped, up 34% in the same comparison. Data is from the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Supply (Mapa).
Egypt was the highlight. According to Mapa, the country is listed at the fifth position among the largest markets of the Brazilian agribusiness in July. Egyptians imported the amount of US$ 261 million, up 32.4% over the same month of 2014. In all, 755,000 tons were shipped to the country, an increase of 87.4% in the same comparison. The main products sent to Egypt were sugar, meat (beef and poultry), maize and soybean.
Another highlight was Saudi Arabia, with purchases of US$ 225 million, up 16% over July of last year. It’s worth reminding that this performance occurred despite the fact that Saudi Arabia was not importing beef from Brazil because of the embargo imposed since the end of 2012. The main items traded were poultry, sugar and soybean.
Considering revenues, exports also increased to Qatar, Comoros Islands, Kuwait, Iraq, Jordan, Morocco, Mauritania, Oman, Palestine, Sudan and Tunisia.
On the other hand, there was a decline of sales to Algeria, Bahrain, Djibouti, United Arab Emirates, Yemen, Lebanon, Syria and Somalia. Yemen, Libya, Syria and Somalia are all countries impacted by conflicts.
Overall, the main products shipped to the Arab countries were meat (beef and poultry), sugar, soybean, maize, live cattle and coffee.
Year-to-date, agribusiness shipments to the Arab countries fetched slightly more than US$ 5 billion, a decline of 2.8% over the time period of January to July 2014. The volume exported reached 8.6 million tons, up 3.8% in the same comparison.
*Translated by Sérgio Kakitani