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Travel Log : "Mas, Mas que Nada..."
Oooooh, ari rai, ooooh, oh bah o bah o bah , mas que nada....Late Wednessday we made a U-turn and swapped grey Sao Paolo for Rio. And the state of Rio has it all, key area and vital for the future of Brazil.
"Ordem e Progresso"is the motto featuring on Brazil´s national flag. Over the past decade, progresso came from lifting underdeveloped social classes (E and D) towards the middle class (C and B) by governmental measures. And this has been one of the key differences with China for instance. China has made tremendous efforts on the front of infrastructure investment at the detriment of stimulating consumer demand. Brazil has come to grips with this and is now focusing on public investment in the South East of the country, responsible for 75% of GDP creation. A teaser is the super port of Açu, 60 miles north of Rio. The port area is 2.5 times the size of the Isle of Manhatten and will be vital for energy and commodity logistics :
Mas, mas que nada...Brazilians have not yet reached the living standard of the West but as they had virtually nothing in the past, they now have more. And more important : a future waiting for them. Hopefully the future wealth will be shared across all income categories. Meanwhile, I hope Jesu Cristo Redentor will keep on watching over Rio, its friendly inhabitants and last but not least, the girl from Ipanema.
2 Comments
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incognito
On 11 Apr, 2011
off topic but very good article: the undercurrent of the (european) economy remains deflationary
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/comment/stephen-king/stephen-king-inflation-targeting-simply-has-not-worked-and-now-is-the-time-to-let-go-2266196.html
The lesson from the economic crisis is that inflation targeting has not lived up to its billing. It hasn't delivered the economic stability we all crave, its earlier successes were more a result of luck than of good judgement and it led central bankers to ignore other economic signals which, in hindsight, told us more about the dangers of financial instability. Chief among those was credit growth. Credit growth in the eurozone today remains very weak suggesting that the ECB has still not learnt the lessons from the past, remaining fixated on inflation when indicators suggest a recovery is far from secure. -
Theo
On 11 Apr, 2011
Very interesting point regarding the socio-economic development of two giants coming from very different starting points.
On one hand China started out as a very "Animal Farm" type of society and economy.
On the other Brazil was a society with few very educated and rich locals and mostly emigrants, and a vast majority of poor and uneducated.
The most interesting part about all of the BRICs is the absolute diversity in socio-economic development - they have clearly not gone for the "one-fits-all" model of the so called Developed world. This is why, despite everything, they are still societies and economies with strong identities and different economic models.
This is what makes them attractive as a "group" and what gives them a solid ground for cooperation amongst them. At any point one either feeds on the other or takes over from the others. They also have understanding and respect for each other. Neither is trying to copy the other. This ensures diversity in development and very high ability to adapt to changes.
This is what is missing in the European Union for example, and the G-7 and OECD in particular. Even after the fall of the Holy Roman Empire there are those who still believe that unity is only achieved by destroying diversity... by the sword in one hand and the bible in the other; or with the help of dogmas of a socio-economic development model which has nothing to show for itself.
