Brazil Overview
| National name: | República Federativa do Brasil (Federative Republic of Brazil) |
|---|---|
| President: | Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (since 2003) |
| Land area: | 3,265,059 sq mi (8,456,511 sq km); |
| Total area: | 3,286,470 sq mi (8,511,965 sq km) |
| Population (2008 est.): |
191,908,598 (growth rate: 0.9%); birth rate: 16.0/1000; infant mortality rate: 26.6/1000; life expectancy: 72.5; density per sq km: 22 |
| Capital: | Brasília |
| Largest cities: | São Paulo, 18,333,000 (metro. area), 10,927,985 (city proper); Rio de Janeiro, 11,469,000 (metro. area), 6,094,183 (city proper); Salvador, 2,590,400; Belo Horizonte, 2,347,500; Recife, 1,485,500; Porto Alegre, 1,372,700 |
| Monetary unit: | Real |
| Languages: | Portuguese |
| Ethnicity/race: | white 53.7%, mulatto (mixed white and black) 38.5%, black 6.2%, other (includes Japanese, Arab, Amerindian) 0.9%, unspecified 0.7% (2000) |
Often referred to as the giant of South America, Brazil is turning into a giant of the global economy. Already in the top eleven largest economies, it is predicted to join the top five by 2025 at current rates of growth. A key factor in Brazil’s rise is its abundance in natural resources.
The recent discovery of a 40-50 billion barrel-field, plus an existing 14.4bn barrel reserve and natural gas equivalent, makes Brazil the eighth biggest oil nation in the world - ahead of Russia. The Brazilian government’s decision to invest as much as $200bn - $300bn of oil revenue in a sovereign wealth fund underpins a country on the rise, with a strong and stable future.
Brazil’s land prices have been kept low by the limited availability of finance and credit. With only 2% of the population holding mortgages, the mortgage market is in its infancy. A few years ago, the longest mortgage available was ten years, but now 30-year mortgages are available at rate of 13%-14%.
A massive, fast-emerging middle class grew by 7m last year and is predicted to boost property prices enormously. It is hardly surprising that current research suggests a property market very much on the rise.
With a shortage of 8 million homes, Brazil’s housing market is seriously underdeveloped. It is estimated that in the next fifteen years, population increase and a strengthening economy could push that figure as high as 27 million. Fast-rising domestic wealth is coupled with a proactive government that’s making a serious investment in the country’s economic security, tourism and infrastructure.
Overall, the investment outlook in Brazil’s property market is regarded as highly promising.
“For much of the decade, slow-growing Brazil seemed out of its league lumped in with the dynamic emerging economies of Russia, India and China in the so called BRIC group. Sceptics said that RIC was more like it.
But slowly and without great fanfare, Brazil’s economy has turned a big corner. Already a global power in agriculture and natural resources, Brazil has added a key ingredient that had long eluded it: a currency with staying power. In turn’s that’s helping unleash the greatest burst of prosperity the country has witnessed in three decades, attracting foreign investors by the score and providing a growth engine for a flagging global economy.
For the second consecutive year, Brazil’s economy is growing at around 5%. That’s still a far cry from Chinese growth levels. But the expansion has enabled Brazil, which seemed on the verge of a massive debt default in 2002, to build up enough stockpiles of US dollars to outweigh its entire foreign debt and become a net creditor nation for the first time in its history.
Brazil has enough money lying around that it recently announced it would follow other booming countries like China and Persian Gulf oil states in setting up a sovereign-wealth fund, worth between $10 billion and $20 billion, to invest its excess cash. In addition to the fund, Finance Minister Guido Mantega unveiled a new $125 billion industrial policy plan to stimulate new export and high-tech industries at home through tax breaks, venture capital and other incentives.”
The above is an extract from an article which appeared in the Wall Street Journal on 13th May 2008.
Brazil’s new found stability has elevated millions of poor Brazilians into the middle class, making it the largest population bracket in a nation long known for having only haves and have-nots. Adding to the optimism, Brazil recently made some vast offshore oil discoveries that could catapult it into the ranks of major oil exporters.
Brazil represents 47% of the landmass of South America. It has a population of approximately 190 million people. It has 7500km of coastline.
Since 2005 around 20 million people have entered the middle class as the percentage of middle class families has grown to 46% from 34%.
History of Brazil
Adm. Pedro Alvares Cabral claimed the territory for Portugal in 1500 what makes Brazil the only Latin American nation that derives its language and culture from Portugal with the native inhabitants mostly consisted of the nomadic Tupí-Guaraní Indians.
The early explorers brought back a wood that produced a red dye, pau-brasil, from which the land received its name. Portugal began colonization in 1532 and made the area a royal colony in 1549.
During the Napoleonic Wars, King João VI, fearing the advancing French armies, fled Portugal in 1808 and set up his court in Rio de Janeiro. João was drawn home in 1820 by a revolution, leaving his son as regent. When Portugal tried to reimpose colonial rule, the prince declared Brazil's independence on Sept. 7, 1822, becoming Pedro I, emperor of Brazil. Harassed by his parliament, Pedro I abdicated in 1831 in favor of his five-year-old son, who became emperor in 1840 (Pedro II). The son was a popular monarch, but discontent built up, and in 1889, following a military revolt, he abdicated. Although a republic was proclaimed, Brazil was ruled by military dictatorships until a revolt permitted a gradual return to stability under civilian presidents.
President Wenceslau Braz cooperated with the Allies and declared war on Germany during World War I. In World War II, Brazil again cooperated with the Allies, welcoming Allied air bases, patrolling the South Atlantic, and joining the invasion of Italy after declaring war on the Axis powers.
After a military coup in 1964, Brazil had a series of military governments. Gen. João Baptista de Oliveira Figueiredo became president in 1979 and pledged a return to democracy in 1985. The election of Tancredo Neves on Jan. 15, 1985, the first civilian president since 1964, brought a nationwide wave of optimism, but when Neves died several months later, Vice President José Sarney became president. Collor de Mello won the election of late 1989, pledging to lower hyperinflation with free-market economics. When Collor faced impeachment by Congress because of a corruption scandal in Dec. 1992 and resigned, Vice President Itamar Franco assumed the presidency.
A former finance minister, Fernando Cardoso, won the presidency in the Oct. 1994 election with 54% of the vote. Cardoso sold off inefficient government-owned monopolies in the telecommunications, electrical power, port, mining, railway, and banking industries.
In Jan. 1999, the Asian economic crisis spread to Brazil. Rather than prop up the currency through financial markets, Brazil opted to let the currency float, which sent the real plummeting—at one time as much as 40%. Cardoso was highly praised by the international community for quickly turning around his country's economic crisis. Despite his efforts, however, the economy continued to slow throughout 2001, and the country also faced an energy crisis. The IMF offered Brazil an additional aid package in Aug. 2001. And in Aug. 2002, to ensure that Brazil would not be dragged down by neighboring Argentina's catastrophic economic problems, the IMF agreed to lend Brazil a phenomenal $30 billion over fifteen months.
In Jan. 2003, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, a former trade union leader and factory worker widely known by the name Lula, became Brazil's first working-class president. As leader of Brazil's only Socialist party, the Workers' Party, Lula pledged to increase social services and improve the lot of the poor. But he also recognized that a distinctly nonsocialist program of fiscal austerity was needed to rescue the economy. The president's first major legislative success was a plan to reform the country's debt-ridden pension system, which operated under an annual $20 billion deficit. Civil servants staged massive strikes opposing this and other reforms. Although public debt and inflation remained a problem in 2004, Brazil's economy showed signs of growth and unemployment was down. Polls in Aug. 2004 demonstrated that the majority of Brazilians supported Lula's tough economic reform efforts. He combined his conservative fiscal policies with ambitious antipoverty programs, raising the country's minimum wage by 25% and introducing an ambitious social welfare program, Bolsa Familia, which has pulled 36 million people (20% of the population) out of deep poverty.
In 2005, an unfolding bribery scandal weakened Lula's administration and led to the resignation of several high government officials. Lula issued a televised apology in August, promising “drastic measures” to reform the political system. By the following year, his popularity had rebounded as he continued a successful balancing act between fiscal responsibility and a strong social welfare system. But after another corruption scandal surfaced right before the Oct. 2006 election, Lula won only 48.6% of the vote, forcing a runoff election on Oct. 29 in which Lula garnered 60.8% of the vote, retaining his office.
People of Brazil
Brazilians are the friendly and talkative people who inhabit Brazil, in South America. They love to play soccer, to dance and to party. They also work hard and are very creative.
Brazil has a population of over 180 million people and it is the fifth most populous country in the world, after China, India, the US, and Indonesia. The rate at which the population is increasing is slowing down. In the early 1960s, women could expect to have 6 children on average. Such figure fell to an average of 2.4 children per woman in 2004.
The Brazilian population is rather young. Two thirds of the Brazilians are under 29 years of age. The population is unevenly distributed throughout the Brazilian territory. Three in every four people live in urban centers on or near the coast.
The people are diverse in origin, and Brazil often boasts that the new “race” of Brazilians is a successful amalgam of African, European, and indigenous strains, a claim that is truer in the social than the political or economic realm. More than half the population is of European descent, while another 40% are of mixed African and European ancestry. Portuguese is the official language and nearly universal; English is widely taught as a second language. Most of the estimated 150,000 indigenous peoples (chiefly of Tupí or Guaraní linguistic stock) are found in the rain forests of the Amazon River basin; 12% of Brazil's land has been set aside as indigenous areas. About 75% of the population is at least nominally Roman Catholic; there is a growing Protestant minority.
Brazil's Economy
Brazil has one of the world's largest economies, with well-developed agricultural, mining, manufacturing, and service sectors. Vast disparities remain, however, in the country's distribution of land and wealth. Roughly one fifth of the workforce is involved in agriculture. The major commercial crops are coffee (Brazil is the world's largest producer and exporter), citrus fruit (especially juice oranges, of which Brazil also is the world's largest producer), soybeans, wheat, rice, corn, sugarcane, cocoa, cotton, tobacco, and bananas. Cattle, pigs, and sheep are the most numerous livestock, and Brazil is a major beef and poultry exporter. Timber is also important, although much is illegally harvested.
Brazil has vast mineral wealth, including iron ore (it is the world's largest producer), tin, quartz, chrome ore, manganese, industrial diamonds, gem stones, gold, nickel, bauxite, uranium, and platinum. Recently discovered offshore petroleum and natural gas deposits could also make the nation a significant oil and gas producer. There is extensive food processing, and the leading manufacturing industries produce textiles, shoes, chemicals, steel, aircraft, motor vehicles and parts, and machinery. Most of Brazil's electricity comes from water power, and it possesses extensive untapped hydroelectric potential, particularly in the Amazon basin.
In addition to coffee, Brazil's exports include transportation equipment, iron ore, soybeans, footwear, motor vehicles, concentrated orange juice, beef, and tropical hardwoods. Machinery, electrical and transportation equipment, chemical products, oil, and electronics are major imports. Most trade is with the United States, Argentina, China, and Germany. Brazil is a member of Mercosul.
Mercosul officially the Common Market of the South, Latin American trade organization established in 1991 to increase economic cooperation among the countries of E South America. It is commonly known as Mercosur or Mercosul from the Spanish and Portuguese names, respectively, for the organization. Full members now include Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay, and (contingent on ratification by the other members) Venezuela; Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru are associate members. The headquarters are in Montevideo, Uruguay. Mercosul is gradually eliminating tariffs between member states and at the same time aiming for a low common external duty and trade between its members has greatly expanded since 1991. A Mercosul parliament was established in 2007.
Land
Brazil's vast territory covers a great variety of land and climate, for although Brazil is mainly in the tropics (it is crossed by the equator in the north and by the Tropic of Capricorn in the south), the southern part of the great central upland is cool and yields the produce of temperate lands. Most of Brazil's large cities are on the Atlantic coast or the banks of the great rivers.
The rain forests of the Amazon River basin occupy all the north and north central portions of Brazil. With the opening of the interior in the 1970s and 80s, these rain forests were heavily cut and burned for industrial purposes, farming, and grazing land. Beginning in the late 1980s, popular international movements, along with changes in government policy, began to reduce the rate of deforestation, but by the mid-1990s extensive burning was again occurring. New policies appeared to slow deforestation in the early 21st cent., but it reemerged as a significant problem in late 2007.
The Amazon region includes the states of Amazonas, Pará, Acre, Amapá, Roraima, and Rondônia; its chief city is Manaus. Although it is not as developed as other parts of Brazil, the Amazon region produces timber, rubber, and other forest products such as Brazil nuts and pharmaceutical plants. Gold mining, ecotourism, and fishing are also important. At the mouth of the Amazon is the city of Belém, chief port of N Brazil.
Southeast of the Amazon mouth is the great seaward outthrust of Brazil, the region known as the Northeast. The states of Maranhão and Piauí form a transitional zone noted for its many babassu and carnauba palms. The Northeast proper—including the states of Ceará, Rio Grande do Norte, Paraíba, Pernambuco, Alagoas, Sergipe, and the northern part of Bahia—was the center of the great sugar culture that for centuries dominated Brazil. The Northeast has also contributed much to the literature and culture of Brazil. In these states the general pattern is a narrow coastal plain (formerly supporting the sugarcane plantations and now given over to diversified subtropical crops) and a semiarid interior, or sertão, subject to recurrent droughts. This region has been the object of vigorous reclamation efforts by the government.
The “bulge” of Brazil reaches its turning point at the Cape of São Roque. To the northeast lie the islands of Fernando de Noronha, and to the south is the port of Natal. South of the “corner” of Brazil, the characteristic pattern of S Brazilian geography becomes notable: the narrow and interrupted coastal lowlands are bordered on the west by an escarpment, which in some places reaches the sea. Above the escarpment is the great Brazilian plateau, which tapers off in the southernmost state, Rio Grande do Sul, where it is succeeded by the plains of the Río de la Plata country. The escarpment itself appears from the sea as a mountain range, generally called the Serra do Mar [coast range], and the plateau is interrupted by mountainous regions, such as that in Bahia, which separates E Bahia from the valley of the São Francisco River.
The chief cities of the Northeast are the ports of Recife in Pernambuco and Salvador in Bahia. There are a number of excellent harbors farther south: Vitória in Espírito Santo; Rio de Janeiro, the former capital, one of the most beautiful and most capacious harbors in the world; Santos, the port of São Paulo and the one of the greatest coffee ports in the world; and Pôrto Alegre in Rio Grande do Sul.
In the east and southeast is the heavily populated region of Brazil—the states that in the 19th and 20th cent. received the bulk of European immigrants and took hegemony away from the old Northeast. The state of Rio de Janeiro, with the great steel center of Volta Redonda, is heavily industrialized. Neighboring São Paulo state has even more industry, as well as extensive agriculture. The city of São Paulo, on the plateau, has continued the vigorous and aggressive development that marked the region in the 17th and 18th cent., when the paulistas went out in the famed bandeiras (raids), searching for slaves and gold and opening the rugged interior. They were largely responsible for the development of the gold and diamond mines of Minas Gerais state, the second most populous state in Brazil, and for the building of its old mining center of Vila Rica (Ouro Prêto), succeeded by Belo Horizonte as capital. Minas has some of the finest iron reserves in the world, as well as other mineral wealth, and has become industrialized.
Settlement also spread from São Paulo southward, particularly in the 19th and early 20th cent. when coffee from São Paulo's terra roxa [purple soil] had become the basis of Brazilian wealth, and coffee growing spread to Paraná. That state, in the west, runs out to the “corner” where Brazil, Argentina, and Paraguay meet at the natural marvel of the Iguaçu Falls on the Paraná River. The huge Itaipú Dam, built from the early 1970s through the mid-1990s by Paraguay and Brazil, provides power for most of southern Brazil. The more southern states of Santa Catarina and Rio Grande do Sul, developed to a large extent by German and Slavic immigrants, are primarily cattle-raising areas with increasing industrial importance. Frontier development is continuing in central Brazil. The state of Mato Grosso is still largely devoted to stock raising. The transcontinental railroad from Bolivia spans the southern part of the state. The federal district of Brasília was carved out of the neighboring plateau state of Goiás, to the east, and the national capital was transferred to the planned city of Brasília in 1960.
Brazilian Culture
Brazilian culture is a culture of a very diverse nature. An ethnic and cultural mixing occurred in the colonial period between Native Americans, Portuguese and Africans and formed the bulk of Brazilian culture. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries Italian, German, Spanish, Arab and Japanese immigrants settled Brazil and played an important role in its culture, creating a multicultural and multiethnic society.
Brazil's cultural tradition extends to its music styles which include samba, bossa nova, forró, frevo, pagode and many others. Brazil has also a large contribution to the genres of classical music, which can be seen in the works of composers José Maurício Nunes Garcia (1767-1830), Antonio Carlos Gomes (1836-1896), Elias Álvares Lobo (1834-1901), Alberto Nepomuceno (1864-1920) Heitor Villa-Lobos (1887-1959). Camargo Guarnieri (1907 - 1993), Cláudio Santoro (1919 - 1989), Osvaldo Lacerda (1927) and Eli-Eri Moura (1963), among many others. Some of the most famous Brazilian classical performers are the soprano Bidu Sayão, the pianists Nelson Freire and Guiomar Novaes and the conductors Eleazar de Carvalho and Isaac Karabtchevsky. Brazil is also the land of the São Paulo State Symphony, regarded as one of the outstanding orchestras in Latin America and in the world.
Antônio Carlos Jobim and João Gilberto popularized the Bossa Nova sound, which was followed by Música Popular Brasileira (literally "Brazilian Popular Music", often abbreviated to MPB). In the late 1960s, Tropicalismo was popularized by Caetano Veloso and Gilberto Gil.
Within the last 20 years, Brazil saw a dramatic increase in diversity in the music they express. Ever since 1985 when Brazil became democratic, popular music, such as hip hop became a widely "unprecedented fashion" However, social classes developed between the poor, middle class, and wealthy. Music was influenced by race and equality facts. For example, poor people would talk about how corrupt the government is, the violent and low class life the live in, unequal wealth distribution, and drugs Nevertheless, traditional music, such as samba, managed to keep the country's music scene united as one.
Brazilian Literature
Literature in Brazil dates back to the 16th century, to the writings of the first Portuguese explorers in Brazil, such as Pêro Vaz de Caminha, writer of the fleet of navigator Pedro Álvares Cabral. During the colonial period, many writers produced chronicles, poems and plays detailing the events in the colony. A notable early writer was father António Vieira, a Portuguese Jesuit educated in the Jesuit school of Salvador, Brazil, who became one of the most celebrated Baroque writers of the Portuguese language. The period following the Independence of Brazil in 1822 coincided with the Romantic Period of literature, and the first Brazilian national writers like Gonçalves Dias and José de Alencar gave prominence to the native peoples. Machado de Assis, an important Brazilian writer.
Cinema
Brazil has a long cinematic tradition, reaching back to the birth of the medium in the late 19th century. In the 1950s, Cinema Novo, (literally "New Cinema") sprang up as a movement concerned with showing realism in film, in the vein of Italian Neorealism and the French New Wave. In recent years, films like Cidade de Deus (2002 - directed by Fernando Meirelles) and Carandiru (2003 - directed by Hector Babenco) gained Brazilian cinema a new level of international acclaim.
Sport in Brazil
Sports are very popular in Brazil, the most notable being football(soccer). The Brazilian national soccer team is very popular, both in Brazil and internationally. The Brazilian national team has been victorious in the FIFA World Cup tournament a record five times, in 1958, 1962, 1970, 1994 and 2002. Brazil has produced many of the world's most famous football stars, most notably Pelé, Ronaldo, Ronaldinho and Kaká.
In second but not less popular comes volleyball. The Brazilian national male team has been victorious in the Olympics tournament two times, in 1992 and 2004, two times FIVB world champion in 2002 and 2006 and seven times world league champion. As well, the female team has already won several of the most important competitions, including world championships and the Olympic games.
Brazil is also home to several sports which have become internationally popular, such as capoeira and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.
Tourism
Tourism in Brazil is a growing sector and key to the economy of several regions of the country. The country had 5.026 million visitors in 2007, placing Brazil as the fourth largest tourist destination in the Americas, the main destination in South America, and second in Latin America after Mexico, in terms of the international tourist arrivals. Revenues from international tourists reached USD 4.95 billion in 2007. In 2005, tourism contributed with 3.2% of the country's revenues from exports of goods and services, and represented 7% of direct and indirect employment in the Brazilian economy. In 2006 direct employment in the sector reached 1.87 million people. Domestic tourism is a fundamental market segment for the industry, as 51 million travel throughout the country in 2005, and direct revenues from Brazilian tourist reached USD 21.8 billion, 5.6 times more receipts than international tourists in 2005.
Brazil offers for both domestic and international tourists, an ample gamut of options, with natural areas being its most popular tourism product, a combination of ecotourism with leisure and recreation, mainly sun and beach, and adventure travel, as well as historic and cultural tourism. Among the most popular destinations is the Amazon Rainforest, beaches and dunes in the Northeast Region, the Pantanal in the Center-West Region, beaches at the Rio de Janeiro and Santa Catarina, cultural and historic tourism in Minas Gerais and business trips to São Paulo city.
In terms of 2008 Travel and Tourism Competitiveness Index (TTCI), which is a measurement of the factors that make it attractive to develop business in the travel and tourism industry of individual countries, Brazil reached the 49th place in the world's ranking, second among Latin American countries, and sixth in the Americas. Brazil main competitive advantages are shown by the sub index measuring human, cultural, and natural resources, where Brazil ranks sixth at the worldwide level, and third when only the natural resources criteria is considered.
Brazilian Cuisine
The cuisine of Brazil, like Brazil itself, varies greatly by region. This diversity reflects the country's mix of native Amerindians, Portuguese, Africans, Italians, Spaniards, Germans, Poles, Syrians, Lebanese and Japanese among others which has created a national cooking style marked by the preservation of regional differences.
The national dish of Brazil is whole feijoada - a meat and bean stew, akin to the French cassoulet.
Moqueca, a Bahia's dish, fishe stew with peppers and coconut souce.
Cheese bread with coffee and a small cachaça bottle; typical products from Minas Gerais. The half-bitten pão de queijo over the saucer shows the inside aspect of it.
The gaucho (cowboy of the pampa) contributed to the national cuisine with dishes made with sun- or salt-dried meats and churrasco (a Brazilian counterpart of the barbecue), a meal of grilled meats in over-sized skewers.
The European immigrants (primarily from Germany, Italy, Poland and Portugal) were accustomed to a wheat-based diet, and introduced wine, leaf vegetables, and dairy products into Brazilian cuisine. When potatoes were not available they discovered how to use the native sweet manioc as a replacement.