The merging between Marfrig and BRF this year drew the attention of the market by the sheer magnitude of the deal – which involves an added revenue of 160 billion Brazilian reais. The deal, however, is part of a much larger growth tendency in the volume of merging and acquisitions (M&A) in the Brazilian agribusiness, as reveals an exclusive survey by the auditing firm PwC Brasil.

According to the study, from January to August this year, 46 merging and acquisitions happened in the country, with an estimated value of 2.5 billion dollars (13,6 billion Brazilian reais in the current quotation) – estimated because not every transaction discloses their values. This is a 39% high in comparison to the next period of 2024.

High taxes, sparse credits and an ongoing commercial war have built the ideal scenario for the increase in the number of this kind of operation in the first eight months of 2025.

For Leonardo Dell’Oso, an associate of PwC in Brazil and responsible for the area of corporate finance, this increase is evidence for the degree of economic uncertainties and policies in which the agribusiness is inserted.

“It's a strategic move for survival. In a scenario of tight margins, the search for better profitability and operating cash flow, this move contributes to cost optimization,” he says.

Since 2008, when PwC started making these kinds of measurements, the years marked by economic crises or sanitary insecurities, such as COVID-19 between 2020 and 2022, saw peaks. In 2025 especially, the ongoing tariff war, led by the United States, strengthened the volatility, says Dell’Oso.

Among the sectors with the most M&A’s, agribusiness, which involves food harvest and livestock, has had a notable increase: transactions jumped from three in 2024 to 12 in 2025.

Another sector that saw growth was meatpacking and slaughterhouses, whose operations increased from three to six in the same period. The poultry sector maintained the number of seven transactions, the same as the previous year.

According to Dell’Oso, a slightly lower number of M&As was expected in the sector. However, the tariffs imposed by Trump and the avian flu outbreak in Brazil in May left the animal protein sector exposed.

“Partners and business owners are avoiding investing more capital and seeking diversification to reduce risks. With the IPO market unattractive, the alternative for these companies to become more financially viable is to sell or merge,” he says.

In Dell'Oso's projections, mergers and acquisitions throughout 2025 are expected to grow 40% compared to 2024, reaching 62 transactions, a number close to that recorded in 2021, when the world was still experiencing the impacts of the pandemic.

For 2026, expectations are also of a high, since economic and geopolitical uncertainties should remain, and Brazil has one more ingredient. “The upcoming elections also generate instability. The tendency is for companies in the agribusiness to face, sadly, doubts and hardships”, he says.