São Paulo – The Brazilian Ministry of Foreign Affairs is holding a commercial mission to Egypt on November 13 and 14, led by foreign minister Aloysio Nunes and backed by the Arab Brazilian Chamber of Commerce. “Egypt is a country that we do significant trade with, but it falls short of what it could be,” the director of the Ministry’s Commercial Promotion and Investments Department, ambassador Orlando Leite Ribeiro, told ANBA.
The diplomat visited the Arab Chamber’s offices in São Paulo this Monday (17) to go over details of the mission with the Chamber’s CEO Michel Alaby and International Relations vice president and ambassador Osmar Chohfi. “We are aware that Brazil runs a relevant surplus in trade with Egypt, so our wish is to increase trade as a whole, whether by increasing imports to Brazil [of goods from Egypt] or by diversifying exports from Brazil [to the Arab country],” Ribeiro said.
Brazil exported over USD 2.4 billion worth of goods to Egypt last year, up 36% from 2016. The bulk of sales consisted of sugar, beef, maize, iron ore and poultry, according to Arab Chamber numbers. Conversely, USD 155.5 million worth of Egyptian goods were imported to Brazil, up 64.6%. Fertilizers, oil and oil products, plant-based foods and cotton made up most of that trade.
Ribeiro remarked that much of what gets exported from Brazil to Egypt is low value-added goods. The Foreign Ministry wants the Arab Chamber to help it find companies that are interested in selling to Egypt, and ones that can supply items that are not widely sold yet.
“We want to identify products which Brazil sells to the world, and which Egypt imports from elsewhere,” he said. “We also want to identify products which Egyptians are interested in selling to Brazil,” he added. The mission to Cairo (pictured above) will include the Brazilian Export and Investment Promotion Agency (Apex-Brasil).
Dollar
The ambassador argues that this is a good time for businesses to invest in commercial promotion actions, since the US dollar is going strong – it is selling for over BRL 4.00 (BRL 4.12 at the time of writing) –, and this makes Brazilian goods more competitive abroad. He points out, however, that participating enterprises must be able to invest in joining the mission and to offer competitive product, and their goals must be in line with those of the mission itself. “We want this to be a result-oriented mission,” he said.
The plan is to have delegates from 20 to 25 companies join. They will sit down for at least five handpicked meetings with Egyptian businesspersons each.
“Egypt is on a rebound, and it has been determined that there’s a strong potential for trade to increase,” said Ribeiro. That potential is further enhanced by the Mercosur-Egypt free trade agreement, which became effective last year and provides tax breaks or exemption on several goods.
On October 9, the ambassador will deliver a lecture at the Arab Chamber offices to provide more in-depth information to companies interested in joining.
Find out more
Brazilian Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Camila Silva Leão d’Araujo Olsen
Commercial Promotion Operations Division – Chief
Phone: +55 61 2030-8530
Email: camila.olsen@itamaraty.gov.br
Arab Brazilian Chamber of Commerce
Marketing Department
C/O Tâmara Machado
Phone +55 11 3145-3277
Email: tmachado@ccab.org.br
Translated by Gabriel Pomerancblum
