Agency Survey: Brazil

Key points

• The total number of students placed by the 46 agencies in our survey was 26,553
• Individual agencies placed between 27 and 10,680 students on courses in 2024
• Overall business growth was 18 per cent
• On average, agencies in received 26 per cent commission from language schools
• On average, agencies in received 15 per cent commission from secondary schools
• On average, agencies in received 11 per cent commission from higher education providers
• Language study was the largest sector of the study abroad market for agencies (85 per cent) in 2024

“Despite Australia and Ireland being popular destinations, we experienced a decline in the number of students choosing them for English studies. In Australia, the number of ELICOS visas issued was around 39 per cent lower than in 2023. We feel that is a result of the changing immigration policies, among other factors such as the rising cost of living and tuition fees. Malta, New Zealand and Dubai are emerging as new destinations. We feel New Zealand and Dubai are the ones that show more potential considering the visa policies and the programs offered, where students can study and gain valuable work experience. Higher education is a booming area in Brazil. We are seeing that more and more students have attended bilingual high schools which means they already meet the English requirements for most colleges and universities. Top destinations are still Canada, the USA and the UK, although we are seeing a demand for Malta and Dubai as well.”

Marcela Amaral from IE Intercambio, www.ieintercambio.com.br

“As the market is quite mature here, selling all programs and destinations, we do not see any major shift, but we do see Malta and South Africa is still strong and stable, numbers increasing in New Zealand and also some evolution in Germany, specially towards higher education programs, where the ruling is very good for Brazilian students. We also see South Korea nowadays present in the daily life of several agents here. Secondary school programs are steady in our top three sales over the years, where we see agents reporting an increasing number of sales to private schools after the pandemic. The main destinations are USA, Canada, UK, Australia and New Zealand. As for higher education we can see it has become very relevant, as it used to be in the top 15 programs in 2015, but top six or seven nowadays. Agents have become more confident to counsel students for HE programs.”

Alexandre Argenta, President of Belta and CEO of TravelMate, www.travelmate.com.br