São Paulo – Apart from buying organic sugar, mate tea and honey produced in Brazil, importers from the United Arab Emirates have recently started buying chilled meat. The strategic importance of the region placed the country in the focus of the Organics Brazil project two years ago. In February 2008, the program participated in Flavours from Brazil, in Dubai. Business started, grew and now the project should support actions for promotion of coffee and sugar at points of sale in the Emirates.
Apart from supermarket chains, which are responsible for imports of coffee, sugar, honey and chilled beef, there are also business opportunities with hotel chains. “We have already received contacts from Arab hotel chains interested in the import of organics. We expect further negotiations, said the head of the Organics Brazil project, Ming Chao Liu.
According to him, Brazilian exports of organic products to the Emirates are still small, no more than US$ 2 million a year, “but the fact of being in a strategic market is already important”. “The concept of organics is still developing there. Nowadays, the main consumers are the foreigners who live there, but the tendency is for growth,” he pointed out. “The great advantage of the Arab market is that you can place end products, with greater added value,” said Liu.
The main markets for Brazilian organic products abroad are Germany, France, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, the United States, Canada and Japan. In Brazil, raw fruit and vegetables are the most consumed products. Juice, sugar, honey, coffee and biscuits also head the list of most consumed products.
As the process for regulation of organics is still in the final stages, there are no official figures, just estimates. According to the Ministry of Agriculture of Brazil, there are around 90,000 properties with organic production. The Ministry of Agrarian Development estimates 15,000 producers.
The Organics Brazil project recently mapped certified areas in the country, in conformity with international regulations, and counted 7.3 million hectares. According to figures obtained alongside certifiers, around 80% of product certifiers are in conformity with the foreign market and around 70% of what is produced is exported.
This year started well for producers associated to Organics Brazil. The project ended the first quarter with US$ 8 million in exports, resulting from two organic product fairs it participated in. At Biofach Nuremberg, in February, the main organic product sector fair in the world, the project counted on the presence of 11 associated companies that closed deals of US$ 6.2 million.
At Expo West, in March, in California, export deals closed by three associates totalled US$ 1.8 million. “The business result was positive within an international scenery of economic return, which was extremely worrying last year due to the global crisis. What may be noticed is that it is presented in a more realistic manner,” said Liu.
The next fair with Brazilian participation should be All Things Organic, on June 16th and 17th, in Chicago, in the United States.
The project
Organics Brazil was established five years ago to promote organic product exports on the foreign market, bringing together companies and producers under a single brand, complying with the most demanding social and environmental standards. It currently includes 74 companies in 14 states and six sectors: beverages, textiles, fruit, ingredients, trading companies and cosmetics.
The project is the result of joint activities between the private initiative and the Development Promotion Institute at the Brazilian Export and Investment Promotion Agency (Apex-Brazil).
*Translated by Mark Ament
