Eldorado and Santo Antônio do Aracanguá – The deputy prime minister of Libya, Imbarek Ashamikh, vested yesterday (17) two state of the art Brazilian agribusinesses: a sugar and alcohol mill in Eldorado, in the state of Mato Grosso do Sul, and a nelore beef cattle farm in Santo Antônio do Aracanguá, a city close to Araçatuba, in the interior of the state of São Paulo. The government of Libya is seeking investment opportunities in Brazil and the agricultural field is one of the points of interest.
In the morning, Ashamikh and representatives of other areas of his government left the city of São Paulo on a chartered flight and headed to the installations of ETH Bioenergy, in Eldorado. The company is controlled by Odebrecht group, which has 67% participation. The remaining 33% belong to Japanese trading company Sojitz. There, apart from visiting the factory, the Libyan delegation saw a presentation about the project and also the sugar and alcohol market, presented by ETH president José Carlos Grubisish.
According to him, the Odebrecht target ever since the company entered the sugar and alcohol sector, in 2007, has been to become one of the market leaders in the global bioenergy market. The group is already strongly present in the areas of heavy construction and petrochemicals. Up to July this year, according to the executive, the company should have five mills in operation.
The company bets that the demand for Brazilian ethanol should rise from the current 24 billion litres per year to almost 57 billion in 2015. Apart from the domestic market, which has been growing thanks to the popularisation of dual fuel vehicles, ETH also believes on growth of the search for alcohol in other countries. Grubisish said that up to 2015, the global market should more than double, with over 69 billion litres being added to the 66 billion litres consumed today.
"Therefore, Odebrecht has decided to enter the market and become a leader," said the executive. Apart from the potential of ethanol as a fuel, the company is going to seek "new markets", or other industries that may use the product as raw material, like the chemical industry or the sectors of additives for petrol and "green" plastic. Braskem, the largest petrochemical company in Brazil, controlled by Odebrecht, has already developed plastic from alcohol.
As a complement for the business, the company plans to sell the energy generated from the brining of the sugarcane bagasse, the remains of the raw material used for production of alcohol in Brazil, and sell sugar. The entire project forecasts 10 mills each with a capacity for the processing of 30 million tonnes of sugarcane a year. The company currently employs 5,000 people.
Total investment, according to the CEO of the Odebrecht branch in Libya, Daniel Villar, who is accompanying the group, is US$ 3.5 billion, being 40% funds of the shareholders and the remains financed by organisations like the Brazilian Development Bank (BNDES), the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) and the Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC). The company business plan, according to Grubisish, forecasts that between 2012 and 2013 ETH should be able to open its capital and list shares on the stock market.
Genetics
In the afternoon, the representatives of the government of Libya visited Guadalupe farm, in Santo Antônio do Aracanguá, in the western region of São Paulo state, on the banks of the Tietê River. The property is specialized in the reproduction and genetic improvement of the nelore breed of cattle – beef cattle broadly raised in Brazil. Among the animals on the farm are champions in national exhibitions, like Expozebu, in Uberaba, Minas Gerais.
There, the deputy prime minister heard explanations about beef in Brazil, the largest global exporter of the product, and about techniques for genetic improvement and management, which contribute to greater expansion of productivity.
"We are studying, eyeing what is best in the economic value in industry and agriculture. That is why we are here," said Ashamikh after the visits. Today the Libyan delegation should spend the day in Brasília.
*Translated by Mark Ament
