SAO PAULO, July 18 (Reuters) - Brazilian beef exports to China will increase by more than $1 billion next year following the decision by the world's second-largest economy to lift an embargo on Brazilian beef, the president of an industry group said on Friday.
The additional sales to China are unlikely to hamper exports to Hong Kong, said Antonio Camardelli, president of group Abiec, which represents beef exporters in Brazil. Hong Kong gained relevance, alongside Russia, as a destination for Brazilian beef exports when China imposed the embargo.
The embargo, which was lifted on Thursday, had been in place since December 2012, when an atypical case of mad cow disease was discovered. Brazil is not a major supplier to China, with just 17,000 tonnes of beef exported before the embargo was implemented.
"We believe that those markets will grow stronger, as a result of efforts that we did prior to the embargo to ship more value-added products," Camardelli said in an interview.
Brazil's farm lobby, the National Confederation of Agriculture, praised China for ending the embargo but said Beijing would need to approve more slaughterhouses before shipments could really take off.
Currently only eight Brazilian slaughterhouses have permission to export to China, the confederation said. Camardelli said another nine facilities are prepared to export to China if approved.
Although pork is a more common staple in the Chinese diet, as demand for protein has increased in the world's most populous country, industry sources estimate that hundreds of thousands of tonnes of beef from countries including Brazil and India have been smuggled into China through Hong Kong and Vietnam.
(Reporting by Fabiola Gomes; Writing by Guillermo Parra-Bernal; Editing by Chris Reese and Ken Wills)