From the Newsroom*
São Paulo – Agribusiness sales grew 16% in the month of March when compared to the same month last year. The sector had total revenues of US$ 3.9 billion, according to figures supplied by the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Supply. The value exported is a historic record for months of March.
Agribusiness imports reached US$ 583 million, with growth of 28.4%, generating a surplus of US$ 3.395 billion in the sector trade balance. The good performance of exports took place mainly due to the sectors of soy, sugar and alcohol, pulp and paper, leather and leather products and meats.
Exports of the soy complex totalled US$ 928 million, 30.8% more than in the month of March 2005, when exports totalled US$ 710 million. The result was powered by sales of soy in grain, which grew 44.7% in quantity exported and 7% in prices.
Meat sector export revenues grew 5% in March, with US$ 618 million, but the volume exported fell 1%. There was a 6% price increase. Exports of chicken fell 5.4% in terms of quantity, but 3.5% greater prices resulted in a drop of just 2% in revenues.
Sales of sugar and alcohol reached US$ 494.3 million in March, against US$ 337.7 million in the same period in 2005. Alcohol export revenues totalled US$ 70 million in March, 4.4% more than the value exported in March last year.
From January to March, agribusiness exports reached US$ 9.797 billion, 11.5% over the value exported in the same period in 2005. In the accumulated result for the 12-month period between April 2005 and March 2006, sector exports totalled US$ 44.609 billion, 11.6% more than the value exported in the period from April 2004 to March 2005, which totalled US$ 39.965 billion.
*Translated by Mark Ament
