São Paulo - Brazil closes out 2003 as the world's biggest export of chicken. It is estimated that the final total value of Brazilian chicken exported to 120 countries at US$893 per ton will reach US$1.9 billion.

The chicken producer and exporter association (ABEF) reports that the export volume rose 25%, compared to 2002.

However, Brazilian domestic consumption of chicken actually dropped between 2% and 3%, to an average 32.8 kilos per capita (5.8 million tons of chicken were sold domestically).

The ABEF president, Julio Cardoso, says that the sector does not expect to do so well in 2004 because the same factors will no longer be present. Those factors were unusually strong foreign demand and a drop in domestic demand. Mercosur, for example, imported over 900% more whole chicken, and over 600% more chicken cuts, mainly due to the economic recovery in Argentina.

There was also the conquest of new markets which helped push exports to new record levels. An opening occurred in Japan which only imports types of cuts that the US does not export.
Brazil could have exported even more except that The European Union slapped a sharp increase in the surtax on Brazilian chicken (raising it from 15% to 75%) and Russia began using a quota system which benefitted European and American exporters. (AB)