All the business opportunities in Peru

What are the main business opportunities in Peru for Italian and other companies?

In the last decade, the country has shown interesting growth rates, proving to be one of the most dynamic economies in Latin America.

The latest data provided by the Economic Observatory of the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs sees a recovery of trade for Italy during the first half of 2021.

After a sharp contraction last year – with Italian exports down 29.1% – trade has picked up again this year, totalling 655 million euros between January and July.

Italy has maintained its position as the EU’s third largest trading partner, just behind Germany and Spain.

What are the factors behind the success of Italian products?

Peru: developing sectors

Thanks also to an extensive investment plan supported by the government, many sectors of the Peruvian economy have developed in recent years.

These include the agri-food and mining sectors, with the latter accounting for around two thirds of the country’s total exports.

Peru has large deposits of natural resources such as copper, silver and zinc. As far as food production is concerned, the country has long stood out for the cultivation of asparagus, avocados, chilli peppers, bananas and more.

The morphology of the land allows for a wide variety of crops, and the transition to a modern agro-industry has marked a marked increase in productivity.

Another industry with great potential is textile one: Peru has long boasted top-quality products known throughout the world, such as alpaca.

However, the production of this material is mostly carried out by family-run micro-enterprises, with inevitable consequences on its availability. The need to innovate production processes and increase efficiency is also the second major challenge textile companies are facing.

The framework briefly outlined translates into a number of business opportunities that should not be underestimated. Which ones?

Products to be exported to Peru

The complementarity between an economy like Italy’s – with its manufacturing vocation – and Peru, with its many processing companies, is evident.

The development of the mining sector in particular represents an opportunity for companies producing components and equipment used in this field such as pumps, filters, control systems, electrical panels and earth-moving machinery.

The large size of the agricultural sector also offers wide margins for growth for companies specialising in agricultural machinery: the need to modernise production processes leads to a strong demand for solutions with which to optimise sowing, irrigation and harvesting.

The emergence of a modern food industry, supported by the increase in per capita expenditure of Peruvian consumers, also offers business opportunities for companies producing capital goods used in this field.

Machinery for food packaging and processing can therefore find space in the country, which has recently strongly increased its exports – up 6% in 2019 – thanks in part to the numerous trade agreements Peru has signed over the past 20 years.

Similar considerations apply to the world of textile machinery, which in Italy has always been characterised by a natural tendency to export and which could find new commercial routes in the South American nation.