More JBS and BRF branches are granted approval for chicken and pork exports to South Africa

BRF and JBS, the two largest poultry and pork slaughterhouses in Brazil, had new units approved by South Africa for meat exports, the companies told Reuters on Wednesday.

BRF will now be able to ship chicken meat from the Lajeado plant (RS), and pork from Lucas do Rio Verde (MT). With these newly qualified units, it will have 20 units authorized to export to the African country. South Africa is the fourth-largest buyer of Brazilian chicken meat and 14^th-largest buyer of pork and is moving up.

South Africa is already somewhat open to Brazilian poultry but pork imports are quite restricted. In 2020 there were almost 20.000 TEU of poultry exported and only some 200 TEU of pork. And out of the 20.000 TEU only close to 1.000 were exported by BRF. So there is a good amount of room in the market for the two Brazilian giants.

Brazilian pork and poultry exports (HS 0203 and 0207) to South Africa | Jan to Dec 2018-2020 | TEU

The company highlighted that the Lucas do Rio Verde unit was already qualified to ship chicken meat and now has one more product option for sale.

JBS, on the other hand, had its Seara subsidiary plants located in São José (SC) and Santo Inácio (PR) approved for the shipment of chicken meat. The company now has 28 poultry and pork units qualified to ship to South Africa.

“With around 60 million inhabitants, South Africa has the highest per capita income on the continent and is considered one of the countries with an emerging economy”, said BRF on the African economic potential.

The executive manager of International Institutional Relations at BRF, Luiz Tavares, said that the qualifications are in line with the company’s plans to strengthen itself in strategic markets.

“Consolidating our presence in one of the largest economies on the (African) continent is essential to expand and diversify our portfolio globally,” said the executive.

Data from ABPA (the Brazilian association of animal protein producers) show that in the first quarter of 2021 alone, the country shipped 78,400 tons of chicken meat to South Africa, an increase of 32% compared to the same period the previous year.

With the poultry sales, the accumulated revenue between January and March totaled US$ 42.7 million, an increase of 42%.

Brazil exported only 1800 tons of pork to the African country in the quarter, but this volume represented a jump of 150% in the annual comparison. According to ABPA, revenue rose 189% to US$ 5.1 million.

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