Recession felt in Brazil’s meat industry

REDUCED availability of trade finance, and slowing international demand, have hit the Brazilian beef industry, with the fifth largest processor, Independencia, filing for bankruptcy.

The country’s beef exports declined for the first time in a decade in 2008, having increased tenfold since 1998, to peak at 2.49 million tonnes in 2007. A further reduction in exports is forecast this year, to 2.08 million tonnes.

Having fallen from its peak in 2007 at 180 million, the national cattle herd is not expected to recover to that level before mid-2010.