FOREIGN TRADE OF BRAZIL

Press, Volume XCII, Issue 27751, 31 August 1955, Page 6

FOREIGN TRADE OF BRAZIL

MORE SALESMEN TO GO ABROAD

DROP IN SHARE OF COFFEE SALES (From a Reuter Correspondent) RIO DE JANEIRO. Brazil is to send a delegation of commercial travellers to 19 nations, including possibly Soviet Russia, in an effort to boost the country’s falling foreign trade. It is being organised by the Brazilian Commercial Association, an organisation of businessmenThe association states that the dwindling share of world markets for Brazilian coffee typifies; the “lamentable condition of our commerce.” At the beginning of the century Brazil had about three-quarters of the world coffee market, exporting about 12,500,000 bags of the 16,500,000 consumed. Today, although world consumption had gone up to about 32,000,000 bags a year, Brazil was selling even less. Last year she sold less than 11,000,000 bags. One of the principal causes of Brazil’s decreasing sales of coffee and other products is her failure to send abroad sufficient commercial travel-

lers, says the association. “Our hotels in Brazil are filled with commercial travellers who come here in search of new markets for their wares, but, with rare exceptions, our exporters stay at the counters of their shops waiting for foreign buyers,” said a spokesman. “In the case of coffee, we neglected to look for new markets or even to conserve what we had. There were not enough Brazilian coffee firms represented abroad, not enough effort made to attract buyers and we are now watching the gradual collapse of our markets. It is for this reason we are going to send a group of our commercial travellers to various countries to study trade problems on the spot.” The countries to be visited are Britain, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Holland, Belgium, France, Switzerland, Austria, Italy, Czechoslovakia, Jugoslavia, Hungary, Poland, Spain and Portugal. They may also go to Soviet Russia and Eastern Germany. The association says that a determined sales drive is necessary if Brazil is to extricate herself from her foreign exchange difficulties. It says that the availability of foreign currency for private imports is only about 12,000,000-15,000,000 dollars (£4,000,000£5,000,000) a month in all currencies. “Bearing in mind the vast sum needed for such essential imports as petroleum products and wheat, our country needs something around a total of 1,750,000,000 dollars (about £583,000,000) a year of foreign currencies,” the association declared. “But last year our exports came to about only 1.500,000,000 dollars ( £ 333,000,000). this year. For this reason we must send our salesmen abroad. And they must be energetic and enterprising.