After hitting a historical record in exports in 2021, the national sector of natural stone registered, in the first semester of this year, a total income of 634 million dollars, an evolution of 10.92% with international shipments, comparing to the same period last year. The data was released this week by the Brazilian Center of Natural Stone Exporters (Centrorochas), which foresees the end of the year with revenues higher than 1.4 billion dollars.
Last year, in the first year of the partnership signed between Centrorochas and the Brazilian Trade and Investment Promotion Agency (ApexBrasil) to implement It’s Natural – Brazilian Natural Stone, the sector closed the year with 1.34 billion dollars in sales. It’s Natural is a project to encourage exports from the segment that currently supports around 148 companies.
From January to June this year, the productive arrangement of stone imported 12.68 million dollars, promoting a surplus of 622 million dollars in the segment’s trade balance.
“The heating of the world civil construction, the development of unprecedented actions for the stone sector by means of the sectoral agreement and still the investment that the companies of the segment have made in their industrial park may have contributed for this evolution. But it is important to remember that this number could have been higher, were it not for the war between Russia and Ukraine”, explained the President of Centrorochas, Tales Machado, remembering that Russia was one of the target countries to be worked on by the sectoral project. “Like several sectors of the world economy, we had to adapt”, he added.
Another important point presented in the first semester of this year was the evolution of the average price of Brazilian materials, which registered an increase of 15.04% in relation to the same period in 2021. The productive arrangement of stones, as several other sectors, has been suffering with constant readjustments in maritime freights due to logistic problems as a result of the pandemic, and the devaluation of the dollar; despite this, the sector has managed to adapt quickly to these scenarios.
Consumer market
The United States remains the main destination for Brazilian products, representing approximately 57% of all national exports. In a more detailed analysis, excluding raw materials, the Americans become even more important, representing almost 74% of the total of exported finished materials. Following the same reasoning, the Mexican market comes in the sequence, with a 5% share, and the United Kingdom comes next, with about 3%.
Observing the behavior of the raw materials exported, China is still the largest importer, consuming approximately 60% of the blocks of stone commercialized by Brazil. Next comes Italy, with 29%.
Exporting States
Espírito Santo (80,54%), Minas Gerais (11,45%) and Ceara (3,42%) were the states that pushed the national exports in the first semester of this year.
About the It’s Natural – Brazilian Natural Stone
The It’s Natural – Brazilian Natural Stone is an export incentive program developed by the Brazilian Center of Natural Stones Exporters (Centrorochas) in partnership with the Brazilian Trade and Investment Promotion Agency (ApexBrasil). The program aims to stimulate and increase the exports of Brazilian natural stones, through a set of strategic actions for internationalization with promotional activities, strengthening the image and development of the sector in the market worldwide.
About Centrorochas
The Brazilian Center of Natural Stones Exporters acts directly on the procedures related to the presence of Brazilian businesspeople abroad combined with commercial and operational activities related to the development and evolution of Brazilian companies.
About ApexBrasil
ApexBrasil works to promote Brazilian products and services abroad and attract foreign investment to strategic sectors of the Brazilian economy. In order to achieve these objectives, the Agency carries out diversified trade promotion actions aiming at promoting exports and enhancing the value of Brazilian products and services abroad, such as prospective and trade missions, business rounds, supporting the participation of Brazilian companies in major international fairs, visits of foreign buyers and opinion leaders to be introduced to the Brazilian productive structure, among other business platforms that also aim at strengthening the Brazil brand.
