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As trade talks continue in Hong Kong, delegates from the G-20 group of developing nations have reiterated calls for major cuts in agricultural trade barriers. Developing nations say a trade deal should not come at expense of hundreds of millions of poor farmers.
Brazilian Foreign Minister Celso Amorim said Wednesday, December 14, that the multilateral trading system has so far created a "development deficit." He says the agricultural protection practices of the developed nations are to blame. "Poor countries cannot wait for another 20 years to see true reforms in agriculture trade. The time to act is now. All forms of distorting subsidies have to be eliminated or drastically reduced," Amorim said. Brazil has been spearheading efforts by the so-called G-20 group of developing nations to put an end to large agricultural subsidies. The G-20 nations argue that these subsidies make agricultural products from the developed nations artificially cheap, in turn making those from the developing nations uncompetitive.
Agriculture subsidies are the major stumbling block in the World Trade Organization talks this week in Hong Kong. The European Union, which has the most heavily subsidized agricultural sector, is refusing to make further cuts unless the developing nations open up their markets to foreign industrial goods and services. Brazil's Amorim says developing countries see the problem in a different way. "The major economies cannot expect more concessions from developing countries than they are willing themselves to offer...It just won't happen," Amorim said. Indian Commerce Minister Kamal Nath put the dispute in stark number terms. "In developing countries including India, hundreds of millions of low-income and subsistence farmers eke out a precarious livelihood from agriculture," Mr. Nath said. "Unless the playing field is completely leveled, they cannot enter the arena of international competition...The ambitions of developed countries cannot and must not trample on the aspirations of four-fifths of humanity." The G-20 has emerged as a powerful negotiating bloc in the WTO. Its members include two of the world's fastest growing economies - India and China - and other Asian, Latin American and African nations, most of them with largely agriculture-based economies. Despite the talks impasse, Mr. Amorim says the G-20 is committed to reaching an agreement on methods of cutting agricultural protection by April of next year. The talks in Hong Kong end Sunday. VoA
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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. 
The push of vigilante groups in Rio de Janeiro's favelas (shantytowns) in the last three years is the most important and alarming information of the just-released study by the Rio de Janeiro University's Violence Research Center (Nupev-Uerj). 
A dispute over drug trafficking territory in Rio de Janeiro has intensified lately, leaving in its wake unprecedented acts of violence, such as the downing of a police helicopter in the northern zone of the city on October 17. Three policemen died and another two were injured. This event has drawn the attention of the international media, who are raising the issue of public security for the 2016 Olympics to be held in Rio.
TELLS ? 4th World Country TELLS ????
What these guys are sniffing nowadys ?
Brazil will fight with US and EU?
Idiots still roaming the country. Soon Brazil will be upgrade to 5th World.
I swear I saw that in the eyes of the Joze Dirdu.