São Paulo – In April, the ANBA site exceeded the 800,000 visits mark and was visited by 861,200 people, against the 707,900 in March. Thus, in the first four months of this year, 2.6 million people viewed the site, which has become a reference in Brazilian Internet when the matter is trade and cultural relations between Brazil and the Arab countries.
According to the Marketing vice president at the Arab Brazilian Chamber of Commerce, Rubens Hannun, the number of visitors received by the agency grows due to two main reasons: the greater interest in the Arab countries among Brazilians and the dynamism of the site itself, with articles published in real time all day long. “We deliver to readers what they want,” he said. “ANBA brings Brazil and the Arab countries closer together through information,” he explained.
Other factors that helped ANBA reach a record number of visitors were the coverage of missions by Brazilian businessmen to the 22 Arab countries and the coverage of trips by Arab executives to Brazil. Another fact is the publication of all articles produced on Twitter. “The agency’s success is mainly due to good journalistic practices, the result of the team,” said the ANBA editor-in-chief, Joel Santos Guimarães. “ANBA has no stars, just reporters with their eyes on the news and the road,” said Guimarães.
ANBA has a team of eight journalists and two translators and has already received ten important journalism awards in Brazil, always in the Internet category. The most recent was the Mapa Journalism Award, of the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Food Supply, in March. Ever since it was established, in 2003, the agency has been coordinated by Meios Agência de Comunicação.
ANBA also has a correspondent in Egypt, another in Italy, a network of collaborators all over Brazil and partnerships with seven news agencies in the Middle East. Some of these agencies, in fact, reproduce the ANBA material, as is the case with Emirates News Agency, which reproduced the ANBA coverage of the ceremony in honour of Brazilian president Lula, promoted by the Arab Brazilian Chamber on March 25th, in São Paulo.
*Translated by Mark Ament
