Brazil Exports Slowed At Ports

Brazil’s booming export market in dimensional stone may be slowing in 2004 – because the material can’t get out of the country fast enough.
Stone exports are facing a lack of ships and containers, according to ABIEMG, the Brazilian Association of the Exporting Industries of Marbles and Granites. The group cites shortages in the Port of Vitória; shipping delays are causing problems with penalties for fulfilling contracts late and possibly losing business.
ABIEMG notes that Brazilian exports for block in January-April this year of $32.2 million is off 7.32 percent from the same period in 2003. Exports of manufactured marble and granite products, meanwhile, grew by 30.9 percent in the first four months of this year to $75.7 million from the same time in 2003.
Brazil’s total dimensional-stone exports grew 23.1 percent in the first trimester of 2004 from the same period in 2003. While that’s a healthy growth rate, the increase for 2004’s first quarter – January-March – from the same time last year in Brazilian stone exports was 33.3 percent, spotlighting the recent lack of shipping capacity
“The problems are aggravating, and if the government does not to act to reverse the trend immediately, it is to get worse,” says Keith Cattley, ABIEMG vice president. “Without excellent investment in infrastructure, we will be in danger of a collapse.
“The exportations of the trade sector that grew 184 percent in the last five years, contributing significantly to the trade balance, tend to magnify the hard impacts of the problem.”