Peru Overtakes Chile in Agricultural Exports for First Time

A milestone years in the making has arrived: Peru agricultural exports topped Chile’s for the first time in 2025, completing a dramatic shift in South America’s farming hierarchy. Peru shipped $14.49 billion in agricultural goods last year, a 17% jump that left Chile’s $13.21 billion in its wake. The overtaking was accelerated by two years from original projections, propelled by blueberries, table grapes, and avocados that have turned Peru’s coastal desert strip into one of the world’s most productive export farming zones. This is part of The Rio Times’ comprehensive coverage of Latin American financial markets and economic developments.

Peru Agricultural Exports: The Numbers Behind the Crossover

The gap tells a story of diverging trajectories. Between 2012 and 2025, Peruvian agricultural exports grew at an average annual rate of 11%, nearly double Chile’s 6.1%. Fruit exports — the engine of Peru’s surge — expanded at an extraordinary 19.6% annually over the past 15 years. Blueberries alone generated over $2.3 billion in 2025, making Peru the world’s largest exporter of the berry from a standing start of virtually zero just a decade ago. Table grapes, avocados, coffee, and cocoa round out a top-five that accounts for roughly 64% of total agricultural export value.

Chile retains a narrow edge when livestock is included: its $1.78 billion in meat and dairy exports push total agropecuario shipments to $14.9 billion, just above Peru’s $14.58 billion. But Gabriel Amaro, president of Peru’s agricultural producers’ association AGAP, said that gap too will close in 2026. “In the last five years, through El Niño, a coup attempt, and seven presidents, we have grown much faster than Chile,” he noted, arguing the structural advantages now favor Peru.

Structural Advantages and Political Risks

Peru’s edge rests on geography, water, and infrastructure pipeline. The country is among the ten nations with the most freshwater globally, possesses nearly all the world’s climate types along its coast, and has over 24 irrigation projects planned that would add 1.4 million hectares of farmland. The Majes-Siguas II and Chavimochic III mega-projects alone would nearly triple the current 60,000 hectares under export cultivation. Chile, by contrast, faces worsening water scarcity and a privatized water-rights system that has led to suboptimal allocation. Its export strengths — cherries at over $3 billion, plus apples, kiwis, and wine — remain formidable but are concentrated in temperate-climate products with high seasonality.

Yet Amaro attached a sharp political caveat to his optimism. With Peru heading to presidential elections in April amid chronic instability, the sector’s trajectory depends on the incoming government maintaining the pro-investment legal framework, free trade agreements, and the restored Agricultural Promotion Law that has underpinned the boom. “If there is no government that expropriates economic groups or creates a second agrarian reform, I am sure we will surpass Chile this year and the next,” he said. As The Rio Times has reported, El Niño risks to avocados, citrus, and asparagus add another variable, though the sector views its diversification as a buffer against any single climate shock.

The $30 Billion Target

Industry projections put Peru’s agro-export potential at $30 billion within a decade if current growth rates and policy continuity hold. Total agro-exports already hit $15 billion in 2025 when traditional products like coffee are included, according to official Midagri data, with the U.S. absorbing roughly a third of all shipments. The opening of the Chancay mega-port — a Chinese-financed facility already handling its first shipments — is expected to slash transit times to Asia, where demand for Peruvian fruit is growing fastest. For Chile’s exporters, the message is clear: a neighbor they once led by billions has not only caught up but pulled ahead, and the momentum shows no sign of reversing.

This article was produced by The Rio Times’ automated newsroom system. How we use AI · Report an error