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 The president of Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, underscored the good indicators of the Brazilian economy in spite of the world crisis and soaring food prices and said his administration's policy is to increase production to combat inflation.
"The Brazilian economy is showing strength and sustainability and I think we are going to continue growing even with this inflation caused by food prices, worldwide, which is most fluid," said the president during his weekly broadcast Café com o Presidente (Breakfast with the President).
"In Brazil we have decided that the best remedy to combat inflation is increasing production. That is why we will continue to promote agriculture," he added.
Brazil is one of the world's leading suppliers of food but international prices have hit the domestic market forcing the Brazilian Central Bank to tighten credit with higher interest rates. Possibly the highest in the world with the basic rate at 13% and inflation estimated in 7%. Compare this with the US where the Fed rate stands at 2% and retail inflation is close to 5%.
Private economists in Brazil expect inflation in the range of plus 6.7%, higher than the latest target of the Central Bank, 6.5%.
Lula in his broadcast pointed out that Brazil has record numbers in job creation and in certain sectors of the economy such as agriculture and construction. In the first six months of the year Brazil generated 1.3 million new formal jobs. which represent a 5% increase over the same period a year ago. He also pointed out most of the jobs were created outside the main urban areas given the very intense expansion of farming and investments in infrastructure and construction.
But in spite of Lula's optimism, Brazil posted a wider-than-expected current account deficit in June as companies nearly doubled profit remittances abroad because of a strong domestic currency, according to data released by the Central bank on Monday.
The deficit reached US$ 2.6 billion in June compared with a 539 million surplus in the same month of 2007. In May, Brazil posted a current account deficit of US$ 649 million, according to previously reported central bank data.
The deficit should widen to US$ 2.8 billion in July, said Altamir Lopes, head of the central bank's economics department.
Multinational companies in the country sent US$ 3.4 billion in profit and dividends abroad, compared with US$ 1.75 billion in June 2007, as gains in Brazil's currency made it cheaper to buy dollars.
Brazil's currency Real has gained nearly 13% against the US dollar so far this year after surging more than 20% last year. The strong real has fueled a surge in imports, cutting the country's trade surplus and affecting Brazil's external accounts.
Foreign direct investment in Brazil fell to US$ 2.72 billion in June from US$ 10.3 billion in the same month in 2007. FDI is forecast to reach US$ 3.2 billion in July, Lopes said.
Risk Is Up
Brazil and Mexico risk ratings dropped nine and six points respectively while Argentina's climbed ten, according to the EMBI index from the US JP Morgan bank reported this Monday the Mexican Finance ministry.
On July 25th, Mexico's rating stood at 165 points, Argentina's at 609 and Brazil's at 217, according to the report.
The risk rate is an indicator used to assess the economic stability of a country and its capacity to accomplish financial obligations.
The percentage number is the difference in quotation between the sovereign debt instruments issued by different countries and those of the US Treasury measured in hundredths of percentage point.
The EMBI index from JP Morgan shows the evolution of yields from those debt instruments which are traded in international markets, issued by 19 emerging countries.
Mercopress
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Hello! 
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.
Even the exports are subsidized, not only the production of goods.
May be he should reduce Brazilian oil prices...which is already 30 % below free market prices.
Reduce the interests rates, one of the world highest....after inflation.
No longer the world highest rates before Turkey but now after Turkey !
Ask any entrepreneur what are his bank borrowing rates.
Ask any entrepreneur what is the costs to their company.....your endless bureaucraty, add the red tapes costs of these administrative bureaucrats plus the additional cost of the company added workers needed to fill the endless forms.
That is the base...of your inflation...when compared with the inflation rate in more developed and better managed countries.
Lack of infrastructure for the transportation of goods also add to costs, therefore to inflation.
Corruption practices for which Brazil excels is also a cost....producing inflation.
Ohhhhh may be Bin the Crook should tell Cia Vale to reduce their iron ore prices.