Mar 20, 2019
Hog Producers in Southern Brazil Looking for Corn from Paraguay
Author: Michael Cordonnier/Soybean & Corn Advisor, Inc.
The Brazilian hog and poultry industry is centered in southern Brazil, but the farmers in the region cannot produce enough corn to meet the local demand. The state of Santa Catarina in southern Brazil produces approximately 3 million tons of grain annually, but the livestock industry in the state consumes approximately 7 million tons of corn annually. In past years, the deficit of 4 million tons of corn generally came from importing corn from Mato Grosso and central Brazil.
Since there are no rail lines or waterways connecting the two locations, some of the corn had to be transported by truck as much as 2,000 kilometers from central Mato Grosso at a very high cost. The State of Santa Catarina is trying to lower that cost by importing corn from Paraguay instead, but to get the corn from southern Paraguay to Santa Catarina by the most efficient route, the trucks carrying the corn must transit through the Argentine Province of Misiones.
In order to facilitate the movement of corn from Paraguay to Santa Catarina, participants in the program met earlier this week in the city of Chapeco in western Santa Catarina to finalize their plans. In attendance were state officials from the state of Santa Catarina in Brazil, officials the Province of Misiones in Argentina, agribusiness leaders, investors, researchers, and cooperatives. The focus of the meeting was to finalize sanitary requirements, intellectual property rights, export and import requirements, etc.
Once all the details are agreed upon, the corn from southern Paraguay would only have to be transported 350 kilometers to get to hog producers in western Santa Catarina instead of the 2,000 kilometers from central Mato Grosso. The savings in transportation cost could be as high as 75%.