São Paulo – Exports of Brazilian meat to Arab countries increased in July in comparison to the same month of last year. Sales of refrigerated or frozen beef totaled USD 98.8 million, up 7%, with fresh poultry totaling USD 229.7 million, up 5%. The data is from the Ministry of Industry, Foreign Trade and Services (MDIC).
In a statement made available this Thursday (3), the Brazilian Beef Exporters Association (ABIEC) said that Egypt was “the most prominent market in the month”, with an increase of 38% in imports of beef in volume, to 18,000 tons, and of 36% in revenues, to USD 64 million.
Another highlight was the United Arab Emirates, to where exports of fresh beef surpassed USD 10 million, almost double the value registered in July 2016. Both countries show up among the ten largest destinations for the Brazilian product, with Egypt coming in at 3th and the UAE at 10th.
Total exports of beef from Brazil came out to USD 540 million, up 31% year-on-year. Fresh beef accounted for USD 451 million of those, up 38.5%, according to Abiec. Year-to-date through July, USD 2.6 billion worth of fresh beef were sold from Brazil to other countries, up 3.1% from the comparable period of 2016.
Poultry
Regarding poultry, the Brazilian Animal Protein Association (ABPA) reported on Wednesday (2) that Egypt, the UAE and Kuwait were major buyers during the month. Egypt imported USD 34.6 million worth of poultry from Brazil – three times as much as in July 2016 according to the Brazilian Ministry of Development. The Middle East is traditionally the part of the world that buys the most Brazilian poultry.
Meat sales numbers to Arab countries are positive in spite of the Brazilian Federal Police’s Carne Fraca operation, a probe launched last March concerning a bribery scheme involving Agriculture Ministry inspectors and meat packers.
The president of the Arab Brazilian Chamber of Commerce, Rubens Hannun, recently said that the organization worked hard throughout the first half of the year to minimize the effects of the operation on meat sales to Arab countries, as did the Ministry of Agriculture and industry associations.
*Translated by Sérgio Kakitani & Gabriel Pomerancblum
