Catastrophic floods cause major disruption to Brazil’s agricultural sector – food storage tanks

Record rainfall in May 2024 in Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil’s southernmost state, caused devastating floods that wreaked havoc on the country’s agricultural and livestock sectors. The flood destroyed food warehouses, stopped harvests and damaged soils. Damaged or blocked infrastructure also limits food transport and farm operations.

Gov. Eduardo Leite describes the rainfall as one of the worst climate disasters in the state’s history. Locals expected rainfall, but the amount and resulting destruction “were not… predicted,” Paulo Brack, a professor at the Institute of Biological Sciences at the University of Rio Grande do Sul and chief coordinator of the Gaucho Institute of Environmental Sciences, tells Food Tank.

Brazil is one of the top five producers of 34 agricultural commodities and the world’s largest net exporter of agricultural products, according to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA). According to the Agency, since 2000, Brazil has doubled the value of its agricultural production and tripled its livestock production. Brazil is expected to bring an additional 20 million hectares of cropland into production by 2031, which will be one of the fastest rates of cropland expansion in the world, according to the USDA.

Rio Grande do Sul makes a significant contribution to Brazil’s agricultural production, producing 14% of Brazil’s soybeans, 70% of its rice and 73% of its oats. According to the Brazilian Animal Protein Association, the state is the largest producer of spring corn in Brazil and produces 11 percent of Brazilian pork and 20 percent of Brazilian poultry.

“The flooded state of Rio Grande do Sul is one of the highest soybean-producing regions in Brazil, as well as a major rice-growing area, and both crops are expected to suffer from the historic flooding,” Joana Colussi, PhD Research Associate and Instructor at Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics at the University of Illinois, says Food Tank. “Some of the crops will rot and be lost; others will have lower yields than expected.”

The USDA reports that between 4 and 20 percent of the state’s soybean crop remains unharvested. The Instituto Rio Grandense do Arroz estimates that only 84 percent of the rice crop was harvested when the rains began. The floods destroyed tens of thousands of hectares of what farmers had to leave behind. To ensure adequate supply and prevent price fluctuations, Brazil has temporarily suspended import tariffs on rice.

As water levels rose, many farm animals also died. Local pork producers are lobbying ACSURS, an estimated 12,600 pigs died in the flood, and local poultry farmers are reporting losses of at least $5 million in fatalities alone.

Julia Catão Dias, a specialist in the sustainable consumption program at the Consumer Protection Institute, tells Food Tank that large-scale destruction will be especially felt by family farms. Many of them, he says, lost not only crops, tools and equipment, but also their homes.

The effects of flooding may persist. Soaked soils will make it difficult to plant crops for next season, and farmers may have to switch to other crops until the soil regenerates, says Silvia Massruhá, president of agricultural research agency Embrapa.

The flood also seriously damaged the state’s infrastructure, hampering the transport of crops and the activities of the livestock sector. The rains destroyed roads, bridges and highways, and those that remained intact were severely blocked. Rumo, the rail operator in Brazil, has suspended rail services to major ports, causing export bottlenecks and increased use of trucks to transport food. Floods have caused 100 blockades on 58 roads and bridges, and alternative routes are forcing trucks to travel hundreds of extra miles, increasing transport costs and times.

Transport interruptions particularly affected the pork and poultry sectors. Blocked roads hampered the transport of animal feed, water and workers, forcing 10 processing plants to suspend operations.

Dias tells Food Tank that product shortages, production disruptions and increased logistics costs will put “pressure on prices, contributing to food inflation in Brazil.” Taking into account the state’s share of several commodities, expected losses and possible impacts on the upcoming season, the USDA forecasts an increase in domestic food prices.

The National Confederation of Municipalities preliminarily estimates losses in the agricultural and livestock sector at over $245 million, and Brazil’s importance in the global agricultural sector suggests that the effects could reverberate around the world. According to the USDA, this has already had an impact on future soybean contracts negotiated at the Chicago Board of Trade.

In the wake of the floods, Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is prioritizing relief for victims while emphasizing the need for Brazil to be better prepared for climate change and extreme weather events.

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Photo courtesy of Ricardo Stuckert, Wikimedia