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 Industrial production in Brazil fell in October as the global financial meltdown sent shock waves through Latin America's largest economy, the government said Tuesday, November 2. It was the largest drop since December 2006.
Industrial production slid 1.7% for the month compared to September, according to the statistics agency, known as IBGE. The hardest hit sectors were the chemicals industry, petroleum and ethanol production and machinery and equipment manufacturing.
Brazil automakers also suffered a 26% decline in November sales, continuing a trend that started last month as credit costs increase, according to the National Vehicle Dealership Association, Fenabrave.
The IBGE report said that industrial production for October expanded 0.8% over the same month last year.
Economists predict that Brazil's economy will expand 2.8% next year, down from forecasts of about 4% before the financial crisis hit. Analysts believe the economy will expand 5.2% this year.
Finance Minister Guido Mantega insisted Tuesday that Brazil is not headed toward a recession, but acknowledged Brazil's recently booming economy has been decelerating due to the global economic crisis.
He said that Brazilian economic growth would be less than 3% next year, but did not offer a more precise figure.
Fenabrave said that sales in November totaled 166,279 units compared with 224,744 units in October and 225,750 units in November of 2007.
Fenabrave's numbers serve as a sign of things to come this Thursday when the Brazilian Motor Vehicle Manufacturers Association, or Anfavea, releases its month-ending sales figures. Anfavea data is considered the benchmark for the industry.
Brazilian car sales had been rising all year but quickly reversed course in late September when banks raised interest rates and shortened term payments for new and used car loans. Banks have been more cautious about bringing on new loans in response to the ongoing global credit crisis.
Nevertheless, 2008 will be a banner year for the top three international automakers in Brazil: Volkswagen AG, Fiat SpA and General Motors Corp. (GM). Sales this year have reached 2.4 million units which is 17.8% above the same period last year, according to Fenabrave.
Mercopress
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Brazil received a huge boost in its international image with its selection as the host of the 2016 Olympics, but it was really just the cherry on top of the overall recognition of the country's ascension to the ranks of one of the world's most important countries. Now, as it finally takes its place on the world scene, there has been a great deal of concern about what kind of image Brazil hopes to project, now that the world is really paying attention. 
The only good thing to say about the visit to Brazil of Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, on Monday November 23, is that it was mercifully short and lasted less than 24 hours. Ahmadinejad had his picture taken being hugged by president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva who gave him a warm welcome and said Iran had every right to develop nuclear energy for peaceful purposes. 
The small, coastal town of Condé is located just a twenty minute's drive from João Pessoa, the capital of Paraíba. The Northeast of Brazil has historically been a place of encounter and mixing between peoples. For millenia groups of indigenous people fished, farmed, migrated and sometimes fought along this large, fertile area. 
The Brazilian diplo-MÁ-cia (bad diplomacy) carries on its accelerated course towards the non-acknowledgment of human rights, although sometimes it takes pleasure in saying that it does precisely the opposite. The visit of Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, is another example of a diplomatic omission that verges on hypocrisy. 
On July 4, 2006, representatives of Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay met in Caracas to sign the protocol for the entrance of Venezuela into the Southern Common Market (Mercosur). After two and a half years, the protocol was approved by the legislative bodies of Argentina and Uruguay, and as of now it may be only days away from being ratified by the continent's economic megalith, Brazil. 
Some sectors of the fight against AIDS have suggested that Thabo Mbeki, the former president of South Africa, committed genocide through his absence from the fight against the illness in his country throughout his two terms. 
One hundred and eleven years after Brazil abolished slavery, the number of workers deprived of their freedom is still huge. They raise cattle, produce charcoal, sugar cane or timber. Some of them, most undocumented Bolivians, work in basements of small apparel factories in São Paulo and other metropolis. 
On November 7, 2009 a few friends and I had an opportunity to take a look inside a Brazilian jail outside the city of Rio de Janeiro. We were able to take some amateur footage of our experience on video (see link below). It's no surprise, of course, that the typical Brazilian jail lacks some of the functionality of those in North America or Europe, but our experience that day was quite shocking. 
Depletion of the Amazon Rainforest is not a new concern facing environmentalists, biologists, ecologists, and a growing number of the Amazonian indigenous peoples. For decades they have feared for the fate of the world's most biologically diverse and species-rich hothouse. 
Geisy Arruda made history this week in Brazil, but for all the wrong reasons. What began as a poorly planned fashion statement has become a worldwide tale. Geisy decided to wear a pink mini-dress to her private college in São Paulo state, and after that, all hell broke loose.
Which was funny since at the same time the BNDES lent around US$ 2 billion to carmakers, at a subsidized interest rate....OF COURSE !!!!!
NOW YOU UNDERSTAND....WHERE THEY LIED....ONCE MORE !!!!!!
Never ever trust what Brazilian offficials say is as true as ever.