Browse Data and Analysis

Singapore’s hotel, restaurant, and institutional (HRI) sector is vibrant and highly competitive with sales in 2022 totaling $9 billion USD. It is highly diverse with a broad range of Asian and Western cuisines widely available. The industry should return to normalcy in 2024.

Brazil’s Executive Management Committee (Gecex) of the Foreign Trade Chamber (Camex) increased import tariffs for three dairy products and reversed the unilateral 10% reduction in the Common External Tariff (CET) for 29 other dairy products.

Brazil is the second-largest chicken meat producer in the world after the United States, and the largest chicken meat exporter in the world.

Post increased the forecast for 2023/24 cotton area planted to 1.67 million hectares (ha), an increase of just under one percent from the 1.66 million ha cotton area estimate for 2022/23.

Total Brazilian ethanol production for 2023 is estimated at 32.95 billion liters, an increase of seven percent relative to 2022 due to the expected increase in sugarcane production and the steady increase in corn ethanol production.

The Brazilian economy is slowly recovering from the negative impacts of the COVID pandemic on its GDP growth, employment rates, and in most sectors of the economy.

The Brazilian orange crop for Marketing Year (MY) 2022/23 is forecast at 410.6 million 40.8-kg boxes (MBx) or 16.75 million metric tons (MMT), a slight decrease of 1.1 percent vis-à-vis the current season, with the resumption of the biennial crop cycle and consequently, a lower fruit load per tree.

Singapore imports more than 90 percent of its food and has a diverse, competitive array of trading partners. The United States and Singapore have a long-standing free trade agreement (FTA), and Singapore is a well-developed market for high-quality food and agricultural products.

Singapore’s food retail sector is highly developed and competitive. The industry is comprised of a range of large supermarkets/hypermarkets, convenience stores, “mom and pop” traditional stores, and specialty retailers.

For 2023/24, Post forecasts soybean planted area at 45.2 million hectares (ha), and production at 159 million metric tons (MMT), based on a yield of 3.52 mt per ha.

With Brazil continuing to produce record corn crops, Post forecasts corn production for MY 2023/24 at 131 MMT, up 1.6 percent from the current season. However, falling profit margins and ongoing infrastructure and logistics hurdles may impact the next harvest’s outcome.

The Brazilian economy grew by 2.9 percent, largely supported by household consumption, which advanced 4.3 percent in the year despite inflation challenges. The labor market recovery continued as unemployment dropped to 7.9 percent by December 2022.