Egypt and Tunisia are respectively the second and third largest Arab exporters with USD 514 million and USD 1.92 million in foreign exchange revenue during H1 2020, according to same source.

Morocco and Tunisia supply mostly clothing items to Brazil. The upward movement in sales in 2019 from 2018 did not continue in H1 2020, as revenue from exports to Brazil dropped 33%, year-on-year. Sales from Morocco to Brazil were down 48%. 

Egypt sells mostly long cotton yarn to Brazil. Textile sales had already declined in 2019 and did so further by 12% in revenue terms.

The behavior of sales from Arab countries is in keeping with the textile industry as a whole, as the novel coronavirus pandemic causes exports to decline across the board. 

"Demand has been weaker, and so total sales, and not just from Arab countries, are unlikely to behave in 2020 as they did in 2019," Brazilian Textile and Clothing Industry Association (ABIT) chairman Fernando Pimentel said.  Textile imports to Brazil are expected to slide by 25% this year.

"Those three Arab countries are traditional textile producing countries. Morocco sells a lot of products to Europe. The big exporters are in Asia, but we have seen sales from African and Middle Eastern countries go up, including Arab ones. That has meant added dynamism," ABIT's chairman concluded.