Investment will reach US$ 756.6 billion until 2013
Valor Econômico
Even with the turbulent external scenario, and going through the turbulence of the presidential elections, Brazil can record investments of R$ 1.324 trillion (US$ 756.6 billion) between 2010 and 2013, according to mapping of investments held by the National Development Bank (BNDES). However, the biggest obstacle that the country will face is the growing of the checking account deficit.
The increase of the deficit will be the price that Brazil will have to pay to grow up above the rest of the world, according to the superintendent of the research area of the bank, Ernani Torres. The expectation is that the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) has an increase of 6.2% this year, after expected review of data from the last year by IBGE. For the next three years, a GDP advance of 5.2% per year is estimated. However, Torres does not believe that the checking account deficit will undermine economic growth, unless the international market considers its size unsustainable. Anyway, the progress of Brazil should be sustained by domestic demand, as well as China and India, countries that should also grow above the world average.
The projection is of a strong recovery in investment rates over the next five years. This year it still should be within 19% of GDP. For the bank, if was not the international crisis, the threshold would be of 21% in 2010. However, the indicator should only reach this level in 2013. It is expected that the country's investment rate reaches 19.7% of the GDP in 2011, jumps to 20.4% in the next year and, in 2013, reaches 21.4% of the GDP. In 2014, the forecasts are that it reaches 22.2%. The impact of the crisis was larger on the sectors of the Brazilian economy aimed at export. In August 2008, the expectation of investment of the steel, pulp and paper and of mining, for the period between 2009 and 2012, was R$ 145 billion (US$ 79.2 billion), volume reduced to R$ 82 billion ( US$ 44.8 billion) in December of that year.
In the latest survey, closed in April, the expectation was already to invest R$ 122 billion (US$ 69.7 billion) between 2010 and 2013, close to the level prior to the crisis. With regard to the sectors aimed at the domestic market, including electronics, chemical and automotive industries, there was greater stability. Before the crisis the estimate of investment for four years was R$ 94 billion (US$ 51.4 billion), which went to R$ 76 billion (US$ 41.5 billion) in December 2008, and, last April, was R$ 87 billion (US$ 49.7 billion).
The oil sector has not been accounted for, neither as the export sector nor as aimed at the domestic market, but it is present in the projections of total investment in the period of 2010/2013. According to the survey carried out by BNDES, which already includes the investment plan of Petrobras there is the forecast that the area will invest, alone, R$ 340 billion (US$ 194.3 billion) between 2010 and 2013, a level superior to all investment in infrastructure, which should total R$ 310 billion (US$ 177.1 billion) in four years.