Mexico's Tequila Regulatory Council signed a new collaboration agreement with Brazil's cachaça authorities this week, renewing a decade-old framework that keeps the two spirits' names legally exclusive to their countries of origin. The signing, reported by multiple Mexican outlets including El Heraldo de México and Diario.mx, brought together the CRT, the Brazilian Cachaça Institute (IBRAC) and the National Alembic Cachaça Association (ANPAQ) at a ceremony marking the tenth anniversary of the original mutual recognition deal.

The event took place around July 31 and August 1 in Brasília, according to Notisistema, with CRT president Aurelio López Rocha speaking on the renewed terms. The underlying agreement traces back to July 25, 2016, when Mexico and Brazil first committed to protecting each spirit as a distinct, authentic product tied to its territory of origin.

What the agreement actually does

The core mechanism has not changed since it was first ratified: tequila sold in Brazil must be Mexican, and cachaça sold in Mexico must be Brazilian, mirroring how the European Union treats Champagne. Mexico ratified the cachaça side of the deal in 2017, and Brazil's National Congress cleared its own tequila recognition through Legislative Decree No. 154 the following year. This week's signing is a reaffirmation and expansion of that legal architecture rather than a new designation. According to the CRT, the renewed instrument is meant to strengthen protection, authenticity, traceability, responsible promotion and international projection for both products.

The trade numbers underneath

Brazil has become a real destination for Mexican tequila, not just a symbolic partner. The CRT says Brazil received more than 4.12 million liters of tequila between 2021 and 2025, a volume the council says justifies its ongoing monitoring and inspection presence in the country to guard against mislabeling. Scale-wise, the two industries remain lopsided: Mexico's tequila sector produced 495.8 million liters in 2024 and exported 400.3 million liters to more than 120 countries, while Brazil's cachaça industry produced 292.5 million liters and exported 6.66 million liters to 74 markets in the same year. That gap has persisted since the earliest days of the accord, when 2017 figures showed Mexico exporting roughly 1.4 billion dollars in tequila to Brazil against about 16 million dollars in cachaça moving the other way.

Who this touches and what changes for buyers

For producers on the NOM system, none of this changes production rules, additive disclosure, or how a bottle earns Denomination of Origin status inside Mexico. What it protects is the export perimeter: a Brazilian retailer cannot legally call a domestic sugarcane spirit tequila, and a Mexican importer cannot rebrand an agave spirit as cachaça. As part of the ceremony, the CRT also awarded its 'Distintivo T' recognition to a Brazilian venue, Iracema, for staff training and service standards tied to protecting the tequila designation abroad, a small but concrete sign of how the council polices the name outside Mexico's borders. None of the houses in our database are named in this renewal. The agreement operates at the category level, covering every NOM-registered tequila regardless of whether we have scored it or flagged its additive status as Verified Pure or Unverified.

What we are watching

We will be tracking whether the CRT publishes the full text of the new tripartite agreement, since the public statements so far describe intent rather than enforcement mechanics. Worth watching too: whether Brazilian import volumes for 2026 show continued growth off that 4.12 million liter five year base, whether IBRAC releases updated cachaça export figures for 2025 to compare against Mexico's tequila trend, and whether any additional Brazilian venues receive the Distintivo T designation as a signal of how actively the CRT is expanding its on the ground presence in the market.