São Paulo – The Brazilian meat company Marfrig is planning on building a plant in the Middle East in the next five years. The country has not been selected yet, but Saudi Arabia is most likely to host the plant. The information was supplied by Ricardo Florence, the company’s vice-president of Finance.
“[The plant] is part of the strategy of our business units. The Middle East is one of our expansion targets. We have several clients there and sales are growing a lot,” Florence explains regarding the decision of opening a plant in the region.
The new unit will focus on processed foods and development will be entrusted to Keystone Foods, Marfrig’s food services subsidiary. Keystone is seeking a local partner to build the Middle East plant.
“Typically, in other joint ventures, our partners have been major local poultry companies, and we cater to the processing end of the business,” says Florence. He says Keystone deals in poultry protein, but that does not rule out the possibility of the Arab plant’s eventually processing beef.
The executive did not disclose how much should be invested or the plant’s production volume.
Presently, the product shipped by Marfrig to the Middle East to Asia and South America. “Poultry and processed items mostly come from Asia. The beef comes from Brazil, Uruguay and Argentina,” the executive says.
According to him, the new plant is not likely to take the place of exports to the region. “We seldom stop selling to a market once we establish operations there. We like having both,” he says.
When questioned whether the Saudi embargo on Brazilian beef in place since December 2012 could jeopardize the new plant’s operations, Florence says no. “We own plants in Uruguay and Argentina, and that gives us the flexibility supply any country, export-wise,” he says.
According to the vice president, Marfrig sells to 140 countries, and the United Arab Emirates, Lebanon, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Egypt rank among the company’s 20 top export targets.
*Translated by Gabriel Pomerancblum
