São Paulo – The delegation of Brazilian companies promoted between the 18th and 21st to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates resulted in business of US$ 47.189 million with the region, according to figures disclosed on Thursday (21) by the Ministry of Development, Industry and Foreign Trade. The figure is the total sales forecasted by companies at the end of the programme.
The meetings included 30 companies in the auto parts, food and beverage and house and construction sectors. The trip was promoted by the Brazilian Export and Investment Promotion Agency (Apex), an organisation connected to the Ministry, with support of the Arab Brazilian Chamber of Commerce.
In the three days of talks there were 636 business meetings, of which 139 were in Jeddah and 497 in Dubai. Some 200 buyers from Qatar, Kuwait, Lebanon, Iraq, Oman, Bahrain and Jordan participating in the roundtables.
“The number of contacts was surprising,” commented the CEO at the Arab Brazilian Chamber, Michel Alaby, who was on the delegation. “And the business generated exceeded expectations,” he added.
Two of the Brazilian companies that closed deals at the mission are Adami S/A, from Santa Catarina, a maker of wooden products that sold 900 door kits, and trading company WK. The company should export 20 containers of sawed wood to a client in Jeddah. This is the first sale of WK products to Saudi Arabia.
“The mission created concrete opportunities for Brazilian companies to consolidate existing business in this important market and also had the objective of opening new space for Brazilian products, as well as attracting investment to Brazil,” said Apex Brasil president Mauricio Borges, according to the Ministry press stated. Apart from the roundtables there were two seminars for attraction of investment, in Dubai and Abu Dhabi, the country capital.
According to the ministry, Brazil’s main trade partner in the Middle East is Saudi Arabia, which purchased the equivalent to US$ 3 billion in Brazilian products in 2012. Of this total, US$ 2.3 billion were in food and beverages. Sales to the United Arab Emirates in 2012 were US$ 2.5 billion, growth of 13.3% in comparison to 2011. “We should continue these trade promotion activities,” finished off Alaby.
*Translated by Mark Ament
