Uruguay’s beef exporters, led by Marfrig, have received approval to export to Japan for the first time in 19 years. That comes just as Uruguay’s exports of beef products had fallen by 4.1% year over year in 2018 and by 21.8% in January 2019. Yet, exporters won’t have an easy time after the signing of free trade deals between Japan and both the EU and Canada gave importers from those regions duty-free access to Japan.