Commodities Shuttle: Expenditures on importing fertilizers rise 83% in the year

Agricultural exports continue to accelerate, but beef, one of the main items in the sector’s balance, is losing strength.

Last month, foreign sales of fresh, refrigerated and frozen meat dropped to just 81,200 tonnes, the lowest volume since the 54,400 in June 2018.

With this, the accumulated volume of October and November reached only 163 thousand tons, below the 187 thousand in September. This drop is due to the interruption of Chinese purchases, after the two atypical cases of mad cow in Brazil.

Even with this slowdown in exports in the last two months, the country placed 6.2 million tons of beef, pork and chicken abroad, a volume 4% higher than in the same period in 2020.

Revenues, on the other hand, due to the valuation of proteins on the international market, rose further. Brazil collected US$ 15.7 billion this year, 14% more than in the same period in 2020.

The great highlight of the Brazilian trade balance continues to be soy, which, this year, has accumulated foreign exchange of US$ 37.3 billion, just from grain exports.

High dollar, North American difficulties in its ports and greater competitiveness of the Brazilian product help sales in this final stretch of the year. As a result, the volume exported in November totaled 2.59 million tonnes, bringing the total for the year to a record 83.4 million.

In 2020, exports were also high, reaching 82.7 million tonnes from January to November, but prices were weaker. Therefore, the collection of that period was US$ 28.5 billion.

Corn exports, with a drop of 20 million tons, are well below initial expectations, but surpass the most pessimistic forecasts, which indicated a volume of less than 15 million. Until November, there are 17 million tons.

The crop failure forced the country to seek the cereal on the foreign market to complete domestic demand. Last month, 621.4 thousand tons were imported, a volume that surpassed the record of 547,000 in November 2016.

The forestry sector is also surprising. Exports of raw wood totaled 2.5 million tons until last month, an increase of 124% compared to 2020.

Pulp exports, on the other hand, are stable in volume, but exceeded revenues from January to November last year by 9%.

The advancement of the area and national production of agriculture also requires an increase in expenditure on imports of inputs. Until November, Brazil has already imported a record 38 million tonnes of fertilizers, up 26% compared to last year.

The worldwide disarray in the production and supply of this input chain caused a strong acceleration in prices.

As a result, Brazilian spending on fertilizer imports rose to US$ 13.4 billion this year, an 83% increase compared to January and November 2020.

The need to import pesticides also weighed on producers’ pockets. 367 thousand tons of these inputs entered in the year, an increase of 17%.

Spending rose to US$ 3.26 billion, an increase of 14%, according to data from Secex (Secretary of Foreign Trade), released this Wednesday (1).

Prices For José Ronaldo Souza, director of macroeconomic studies and policy at Ipea (Institute for Applied Economic Research), international commodity prices show an upward trend, due to the rebuilding of stocks and the heating of demand.

Soy The StoneX consultancy has revised the forecasts for the production of soybeans for the 2021/22 harvest. The estimate is 145.1 million tons. With planting nearing the end, expectations remain very favorable for the production of the oilseed, according to the consultancy.

Corn The cereal is recovering from the sharp fall this year and should reach 120.1 million tonnes. Exports will rise to 41 million in 2022, up from 18.5 million this year, according to estimates by Stonex.