|
Bird flu, which killed thousands of chickens in Asian countries in 2005, caused Brazilian exports to decline. On the other hand, chicken prices fell on the domestic market, and Brazilians consumed more chicken.
This is the assessment made by Adriana Santos, an analyst with the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE), on the basis of a study released by the institute yesterday, June 29. The study shows that between January and March of this year slightly more than a billion chicken were slaughtered, a 12.21% increase in comparison with the same period last year. The total number of chicken slaughtered was, however, only 1.71% greater than in the final quarter of 2005. In the first quarter of this year, beef exports and domestic consumption of beef also increased. The IBGE study indicates that around seven million head of cattle were slaughtered during this period, nearly 10% more than in the first quarter of 2005 and 3.25% more than in the final quarter of last year. According to Santos, the cases of hoof and mouth disease that occurred in the Midwest region through the end of 2005 did not affect exports at the beginning of this year. As for milk production, the study shows that there was a drop of 4.56% in the first quarter of this year in comparison with the fourth quarter of last year in consequence of low prices. "Domestic milk prices were very low, inducing dairy farmers to reduce their production," Santos explained. Nevertheless, she said, domestic milk production was up 5% in comparison with the first quarter of 2005. "In general terms the cattle sector is expanding at the start of this year, maintaining the same pace as last year." Egg production grew 5.47% in relation to the first quarter of 2005, 14.12% more hides were purchased, and 9.18% more hogs were slaughtered than in the first quarter of last year. ABr
 |
Subscribe to this comment's feed
The small, coastal town of Condé is located just a twenty minute's drive from João Pessoa, the capital of Paraíba. The Northeast of Brazil has historically been a place of encounter and mixing between peoples. For millenia groups of indigenous people fished, farmed, migrated and sometimes fought along this large, fertile area. 
The Brazilian diplo-MÁ-cia (bad diplomacy) carries on its accelerated course towards the non-acknowledgment of human rights, although sometimes it takes pleasure in saying that it does precisely the opposite. The visit of Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, is another example of a diplomatic omission that verges on hypocrisy. 
On July 4, 2006, representatives of Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay met in Caracas to sign the protocol for the entrance of Venezuela into the Southern Common Market (Mercosur). After two and a half years, the protocol was approved by the legislative bodies of Argentina and Uruguay, and as of now it may be only days away from being ratified by the continent's economic megalith, Brazil. 
Some sectors of the fight against AIDS have suggested that Thabo Mbeki, the former president of South Africa, committed genocide through his absence from the fight against the illness in his country throughout his two terms. 
One hundred and eleven years after Brazil abolished slavery, the number of workers deprived of their freedom is still huge. They raise cattle, produce charcoal, sugar cane or timber. Some of them, most undocumented Bolivians, work in basements of small apparel factories in São Paulo and other metropolis. 
On November 7, 2009 a few friends and I had an opportunity to take a look inside a Brazilian jail outside the city of Rio de Janeiro. We were able to take some amateur footage of our experience on video (see link below). It's no surprise, of course, that the typical Brazilian jail lacks some of the functionality of those in North America or Europe, but our experience that day was quite shocking. 
Depletion of the Amazon Rainforest is not a new concern facing environmentalists, biologists, ecologists, and a growing number of the Amazonian indigenous peoples. For decades they have feared for the fate of the world's most biologically diverse and species-rich hothouse. 
Geisy Arruda made history this week in Brazil, but for all the wrong reasons. What began as a poorly planned fashion statement has become a worldwide tale. Geisy decided to wear a pink mini-dress to her private college in São Paulo state, and after that, all hell broke loose. 
The push of vigilante groups in Rio de Janeiro's favelas (shantytowns) in the last three years is the most important and alarming information of the just-released study by the Rio de Janeiro University's Violence Research Center (Nupev-Uerj). 
A dispute over drug trafficking territory in Rio de Janeiro has intensified lately, leaving in its wake unprecedented acts of violence, such as the downing of a police helicopter in the northern zone of the city on October 17. Three policemen died and another two were injured. This event has drawn the attention of the international media, who are raising the issue of public security for the 2016 Olympics to be held in Rio.