Brazil’s 2020 agricultural output reached a record $89 bi

Brazil’s agricultural production in 2020 reached a record-breaking $89 billion, 30.4 percent above 2019. A total of 255.4 million tons of cereals, legumes, and oleaginous plants were produced—a harvest five percent larger than the previous year. In the same comparison, the planted area grew 2.7 percent, adding up to 83.4 million hectares.

The data were made public today (Sep. 22) by the government’s statistics agency IBGE.

“As the dollar gained in value compared to the real, there was also a growth in the external demand for these products, which made a direct impact on the main commodity prices, which in turn showed a significant increase over the course of the year. As a result, the ten main agricultural goods in 2020 saw a major surge in their production value against the previous year,” IBGE stated.

The crop with the highest contribution in the 2020 harvest was soybeans, the top product on Brazil’s export agenda, with an output of 121.8 million tons, generating $32 billion—35 percent higher than the production of this crop in 2019.

Last year, Mato Grosso state was the country’s biggest producer of cereals, legumes, and oleaginous plants, as it raised its national proportion to 16.8 percent.

Of the 5,570 Brazilian municipalities, 50 concentrate 22.7 percent ($20.2 billion) of the total value of the country’s domestic output. Twenty of these 50 municipalities are in Mato Grosso, six in Bahia, and six in Mato Grosso do Sul.