Agricultural machinery industry grows even without government funding release

Even with the unpredictability about the release of agricultural credit by the government, the agricultural machinery industry grew 9% in the first quarter of this year in the country, an index that exceeds the initial forecast of 5% for 2022, according to data from Abimaq (Associação Brasileira of the Machinery and Equipment Industry), and the bias is high for performance this year.

The numbers were released by the association this Wednesday (27) in Ribeirão Preto (313 km from São Paulo), during the 27th Agrishow (International Fair of Agricultural Technology in Action).

“We still haven’t reviewed [a previsão do ano]we continue with 5%, with an upward bias […] said Pedro Estevão, president of the Sectorial Chamber of Agricultural Machinery and Implements at Abimaq.

The sector’s performance was boosted by historic sales recorded at agricultural fairs already held this year, after hiatuses that reached two years due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Together, Expodireto Cotrijal, in Não-Me-Toque (RS), Show Rural Coopavel, in Cascavel (PR), and Tecnoshow Comigo, in Rio Verde (GO), generated R$ 18.7 billion in business intentions, according to the organizations —the values ​​consider closed sales and forwarded deals. The sum of the values ​​negotiated in the three fairs in their last on-site editions was R$ 8.7 billion.

Last Monday (25) the sector asked President Jair Bolsonaro (PL) to release agricultural credits via Moderfrota and Pronaf (Program for Strengthening Family Agriculture), totaling R$ 44 billion, of which R$ 32 billion for the former. program, and the rest for the second. There was no signal from the government about the request.

Bolsonaro visited Ribeirão this Monday (25) to participate in the opening ceremony of the fair. He rode a motorcycle between Leite Lopes airport and the fair site, rode a horse and, before the ceremony, met with leaders of the agricultural entities that organize the fair.

Members of associations participating in Agrishow reported frustration with the fact that Bolsonaro did not announce any measures involving the release of resources for agricultural financing. After the opening, Bolsonaro left the farm that houses the event in the back of a van.

The amount requested exceeds the total released in 2021, which reached R$ 11 billion for the two programs. “We don’t know exactly how the government will work with this, what we do know is the current Safra Plan, which was launched there in July last year, was quite small. We received around R$ 11 billion for the two lines Moderfrota and Pronaf. For those who earned R$ 82 billion, that resource ended in three four months. We have been talking with the government to see how it can improve this volume of resources for agribusiness”, said Estevão.

The forecast is that the general machinery market will earn around R$ 100 billion in 2022, compared to R$ 82 billion registered last year.

The movement in the streets of the area of ​​520 thousand square meters in which the Agrishow is held was intense in the first three days of the event, which made the organization affirm this Wednesday that the attendance record must be beaten. The fair will end this Friday (29) and the initial forecast is to receive 150,000 Brazilian and foreign visitors.

Invoicing should also grow and even double compared to the R$ 2.9 billion (in nominal values) negotiated in 2019, in the last in-person edition of the fair. “Yes, it’s possible [atingir o dobro das vendas], because we need to understand that there is an inflationary effect there too. Between 2020 and 2021, we increased the price of machines by 40%. It’s going in that direction, because there’s a lot of public, there’s a lot of business,” said Estevão.