The 12th Sweet Brazil
International fair, that was held between August 10th and
13th in Recife, Pernambuco, received a record number of 35,000 visitors from
Europe, United States, South America, Middle East and Africa, and Brazilians
from all over the country.
The event
has been hailed as a success by its organizers, ABICAB,
the Brazilian Chocolate, Sugar Candies and Peanuts Manufacturers Association,
and ABAD, Brazilian Association of
Wholesalers and Distributors.
Originally
launched as a national trade show, Sweet Brazil has expanded and has been
attracting more buyers each year because it offers a good opportunity to see
first-hand the annual new launches by the Brazilian industry of chocolate,
sugar candies, peanuts and gums. Brazil is the 4th biggest producer of
chocolate, sugar confectionery and gum in the world and has been investing
heavily in new technology and machinery to attend to market needs and expand
its share of the international market. "Brazil now has the scale and is
cost effective to be able to export," said Getúlio Ursulino Netto,
president of ABICAB.
The
country has 117 confectionery companies, 93 are local and 22 multinationals,
and together they produced in 2008 994.00 tons of sweets, representing a total
of U$7.5 billion. Out of those, 46 companies export products worldwide.
With 85
million real consumers, 50 million eventual consumers and 15 million prospects,
Brazil has an enviable domestic market that grows by 15% every five years.
Following the international trend, the demand for chocolate has been increasing
in the country and Brazilians are now consuming an average of 2.64kg of
chocolate a year. "Brazil now is looking more and more like Europe, where
consumers are preferring to consume chocolate over sugar confectionery,” said
Getúlio.
In the past 10 years, chocolate exports have increased by 159% and exports of
sugar confectionery and gum have grown by 151% – nowadays 124 countries buy
Brazilian chocolate and 135 import sugar confectionery and gum from the
country. According to ABICAB, one of the reasons for successful expansion of
the Brazilian industry in the external market has been the support from Apex-Brasil (the Brazilian Trade and
Investment Promotion Agency) which supports Brazilian exports and, together
with ABICAB for the past 8 years, has been working with trade promotion and
supporting the Brazilian chocolate and candies producing companies that take
part in international trade shows.
Featured at Sweet Brazil
Embaré, is a Brazillian leader in the milk caramels
sector. It currently exports 45% of its candy production to 49 countries and
has maintained a steady annual growth of 27% for the past 10 years.
Fini, the Brazilian subsidiary of Spanish confectionery Sánchez Cano S/A, exports 16% of its
production. Fini currently produces jelly beans, gummies, marshmallows, an bubble gums.
Mr.
Alain Wehbe, Account Manager for Middle East, Africa, Europe and Asia Pacific
for Garoto, believes that the increase
of investments is shown on the number of new products presented by all the
companies at the fair – 100 products. Garoto is one of the leaders in the
Brazilian sweets market, producing 110,000 tons a year and has invested U$110
million on new machinery which will also be used for the production a of a new
line of its best selling product "Serenata de
Amor", also launched at the Sweet Brazil.
Launched at Sweet Brazil
With 70
years of tradition in the production of candies, Docile
introduced a new line of chewing gum – Zoah! Available
in mint, grape, tutti-frutti and strawberry flavours. To add to its appeal, and
in tune with young consumers, Docile created an application on Orkut (the
biggest Brazilian social network) where consumers can play with the characters
specially created for the Zoah! campaign. The company currently exports to 45
countries under its own label as well as private label.
Producing
23 items, Harald, currently supplies to the
candy, bakery and ice cream industry has introduced at the fair smaller
packages to its currently line of products, aiming at the domestic market.
Peccin launched a
new line of flat lollipop as well as chewing gum and toffees.
Wallerius launched a
new tattoo lollipop – Beija Coração – a
lollipop with a heart shaped tattoo that can be applied to any part of the
body.
Every year at the event, hard lollipop
manufacturer Florestal launches
around 10-15 products, and at the fair this year it launched lines of flat
lollipop, hard candy and chewing gum.
www.abicab.org.br
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