More than 400 exhibitors, including 130 from outside Brazil, came to the capital city of Espírito Santo state on 26 February – 1 March. With 330,000 inhabitants, this Brazilian city (the capital city of Espírito Santo state) situated by the Atlantic Ocean hosted a few thousand of stone industry specialists at the 35th edition of Victoria Stone Fair.

Among the exhibitors there were the largest machine manufacturers such as Breton, Caterpillar, Comandulli, Dellas, Diamant Boart, Donatoni, Gaspari Menotti, Intermac Glass & Stone Division, Pellegrini Meccanica, Simec. Among global stone suppliers the most important players presented their offers, for example R.e.d. Graniti Mineração, but also Dorking group. Among the Brazilian companies, the stand of Ecotools attracted attention.

This company deals with producing diamond wires and diamond tools. At the fair there were also quite young, but rapidly developing companies. The stand of Alfa Graniti Spa stood out from the rest. This Brazilian company was established in 1998, although it takes advantage of the 20-year long experience of the family engaged in the processing of marbles and granites.

Four most important countries for stone export, to which the Brazilian raw material reaches, are the United States, China, Italy and Spain. So far the greatest contracts have been made with the USA. Almost 80% out of nearly 770,000 tons of stone went there which resulted in the worth of exported final goods around 620 million dollars. This is all important because Brazil is going to be a destination for the fans of… football, but also for tourists.

The reason is obvious – the World Football Championship in 2014 and the Olympic Games in 2016 are coming. Brazil will be the host of those two events which undoubtedly means a lot of building projects in the whole country. For sure many of them will require the use of natural stone.   

Photo: ŚK archives