São Paulo – Oman was the ninth main buyer of products exported by trading companies in the first five months of the year. According to the Ministry of Development, Industry and Foreign Trade, the nation spent US$ 217 million with products supplied by these companies, answering to 2.24% of all they sold abroad. There was growth of 60% in comparison with the total imported from January to May 2012. At the time, purchases from Oman reached US$ 135 million.
Other Arab countries, like Saudi Arabia and Libya also figured in the list of 20 main clients for Brazilian trading companies in the first five months of this year. Saudi Arabia is in the 18th position, with purchases of US$ 89.8 million, but with a reduction of 61.5%, as from January to May 2012, purchases had totalled US$ 233 million. Libya, in 20th place, increased its purchases from US$ 49 million to US$ 83 million, growth of 69%.
Yet other Arab countries imported from Brazilian trading companies in the period: Egypt, Algeria, the United Arab Emirates, Tunisia, Lebanon, Sudan, Qatar, Morocco, Yemen, Kuwait, Jordan, Bahrain, Iraq, Syria, Djibouti, Mauritania and the Comoros. The main markets for sales, however, were China, with US$ 3.9 billion, or 41.2% of the total, Japan, with US$ 789 million and a share of 8.1%, and South Korea, with US$ 547.8 million, or 5.6% of the total.
In the total sold abroad by Brazilian trading companies, there was a small reduction as against the same period last year, with sales falling 0.08%. While from January to May this year the sector export revenues had totalled US$ 9.709 billion, in the same period in 2012 revenues were US$ 9.71 billion. Shipments consisted mostly of basic products, which answered to 86.6% of the total. Topping the list were items like iron ore, soy in grain, maize in grain, soy chaff, sugar in bulk, frozen orange juice and coffee, among others.
In May, alone, trading companies had revenues of US$ 2.33 billion with exports, with a reduction of 1.69% over the same period in 2012, when revenues totalled US$ 2.36 billion. China was also the main buyer, with US$ 1.14 billion, 43% of the total.
*Translated by Mark Ament
