The vice-presidency of the regional government, which is responsible for the Azores’ external relations, is the partner that the regional secretariat for agriculture and the environment considers essential for finding new markets for Azorean agricultural products.
António Ventura, interviewed by DI (Diário Insular newspaper in Angra) yesterday, said that the national market is saturated, as it is a center that receives agri-food from all over Europe and “provides low prices for our products.”
To overcome this situation, the regional secretary argues that the region has to face “the challenge of conquering new markets”.
Ventura was thus explaining to DI the significance of his call for the geographical expansion of the placement of Azorean products made last weekend at the Agricultural Fair (Agroter) held on the island of Terceira.
“It’s up to the Regional Government, in what is a commitment to promotion and dissemination, to find new markets beyond the national one, markets that even have an appetite for our geopolitics, such as the United States, Brazil or China,” he said.
“In collaboration with the Vice President of the Regional Government, we’re going to build a force for the projection of our agri-food. We need to sell where we haven’t sold before. Markets with millions of consumers and many of them with Azorean roots,” said the secretary in his statements to DI.
When Artur Lima took on the role of External Relations in the current Regional Government of the Azores, he committed to attracting foreign investment and placing Azorean products in promising markets.

UNEXPLAINED PRICES
According to António Ventura, there is still a discrepancy between the value of Azorean products exported and the price paid to producers.
He believes that the Observatory of Agri-Food Prices in the Azores, to be implemented this year, “will make it possible to understand why this appreciation, in quantitative terms, is not at the first link in the chain.”
It was recently reported that the price of milk to the end consumer is rising,
Speaking at Agroter, the secretary praised the Agricultural Association of Terceira Island for organizing the event, “an organization that requires financial resources and the participation of producers.”
“The Association has its limitations and even so, within this framework, it manages to bring together a group of producers every year who show the best of what they’ve done during the year, whether in dairy farming, beef farming, horticulture, fruit farming, floriculture or viticulture, in other words, a diversified sample of Terceira Island, but not just centered on the island in terms of projection and socio-economic impact, because what happens here has repercussions at regional level, but also at national level,” he said.

in Diário Insular, José Lourenço-director

Translated to English as a community outreach program from the Portuguese Beyond Borders Institute (PBBI) and the Modern and Classical Languages and Literatures Department (MCLL) as part of Bruma Publication and ADMA (Azores-Diaspora Media Alliance) at California State University, Fresno, PBBI thanks Luso Financial for sponsoring NOVIDADES.