São Paulo – Brazil exported the equivalent of US$ 669 million in poultry in July, a 3.8% increase in comparison with the same month of last year. The volume shipped, however, dropped by 13.8% and totalled 320,800 tonnes. The information was disclosed this Thursday (11th) by the Brazilian Poultry Union (Ubabef).
“Apart from the fact that July 2010 was an exceptional period, sales-wise, the low dollar [exchange rates] during the month has contributed to the decline, as did the seasonal drop in consumption in the European continent and some other markets, the Russian embargo on Brazilian poultry and the international crisis that has affected the economies of wealthy countries,” said Francisco Turra, the executive president of Ubabef, according to a statement issued by the organization.
Year-to-date, foreign sales revenues reached US$ 4.67 billion, a 24.3% increase over the same period of 2010. The volume shipped, however, grew by only 3.4%, in the same basis of comparison, and reached 2.24 million tonnes, which points to an increase in the price of the product.
The Ubabef informed that from July last year until the same month of 2011, the production cost increased, not to mention the depreciation of the dollar against the Brazilian real, which made the Brazilian product more costly abroad. The price of one 60-kilogram bag of maize grew by 38.4% during the period, and the price of the bag of soy chaff rose by 1.1%. In turn, the United States currency dropped by 13.1%.
In the first seven months of the year, the Middle East remained the leading target region for Brazilian poultry, having imported 828,200 tonnes for a total of US$ 1.57 billion. Next come Asia, the European Union, Africa, the Americas and other European countries.
The Ubabef also disclosed egg export figures. A total of 8,200 tonnes were shipped from January to July, a 53.2% decline compared with the same period of 2010. Export revenues reached US$ 14.6 million, a 44% drop using the same basis of comparison.
*Translated by Gabriel Pomerancblum
