Vol. Teac. XIII - Latin America GDP Growth 2010

      Lately, we are reading a lot of good economic news about Latin America, specially about South America. It seems that finally, after to struggle too many years to guarantee the economic stabilization, S.A. has found a faster pace in direction to a higher GDP growth, more development with all benefits that this brings to the population, mainly in the labor market, consequently in the rising of wages.

      According to a recent ECLAC report published in December, 2010. L.A. and the caribbean will grow 6% in 2010, being South America 6.6%, Mexico and Central America 4.9% and the Caribbean 0.5%.

      The L.A. champion in GDP gowth of 2010, is  the: 1º Paraguay 9.7%,  2º Uruguay 9.0%,  3º Peru 8.6%,  4º Argentina 8.4%,  5º  Brazil 7.7º,  6º Mexico 5.3%,  7º Chile 5.2%.

       On the other hand, the highest falls were Haiti -7%, due to earthquake and Venezuela -1.6%.

       High levels of world liquidity would push down exchange rates while pushing up commodity prices, which could harm the external accounts and lead to excessive specialization in the production and export of commodities.

       According to another report from ECLAC, L.A. growth rate could outstrip the global average this decade(2010-2019). It seems that L.A. has learned from its lost decade of the eighties and from its debt crisis. Panama has got its investment grade in 2010, the others who have already are: Brazil, Chile, Mexico and Peru. The probably next are: Uruguay and Colombia. Colombia is emerging as South America 3º largest oil producer after Brazil and Venezuela.

       However to bolster the improvements in the labour market and generate more productive employment, the countries need to identify and remove bottleneck, mainly in the education and to strengthen their macroeconomic policies and their jurisdictional security.

    Unemployment in L. A. falls as a result of the economic recovery, equally important is the creation of ¨green jobs¨, particularly in Brazil, Where many houses have been equiped with solar paneled and many persons are working in the recycling industry.

Sustaining Latin America`s Transformation.

    This report was published at Finance and Development magazine in March,2011 and was written by Nicolás Eyzaguirre, IMF`s Western Hemisphere Department`s Director. This is a summary and the title is above.

    With the global crisis behind it, L.A. endowed with a wealth of commodities and now facing favorable external conditions, has great economic opportunities and the potential to become an increasingly important global player. Three countries in the region: Argentina, Brazil and Mexico, are members of the G20.
    Better policies played a critical role in the region`s recent relative success, supported by much broader social consensus about the importance of macroeconomic stability.
    Now more people are experiencing a higher standard of living, compared with previous periods of economic expansion. Income distribution, a long-standing weakness in the region, improved in 15 out 18 countries in the region. Increased government transfer to the poor, as well as a narrowing of the wage gap between skilled and low-sklled workers, help explain these improvements. The region`s success in bringing down inflation, which hurts poor people most, has also played a key role.
    The region has the potential to become more prominent on the global stage and raise its share of world output, which has been stable at about 8 to 9% in recent decades. The region`s output grew by about 6% in 2010(second only to Asia) and is projected at about 4 to 5% in the coming years, well above its 30-year average of less than 3%.
    Achieving or even bettering this outcome will require skillful macroeconomic management as well as structural reforms to strengthen the resilience to shocks and boost growth.
   L.A. also needs to be careful about complacency when things are going well. Currently, global conditions have combined to create two very strong tailwinds that are helping L.A., easy external financing and strong commodities prices.
   Boosting productivity and competitiveness remains the key policy challenge over the medium and longer term, although the reasons for low productivity are complex. there is a need for progress on several fronts.
   PUBLIC INVESTMENT - Which is low relative to the more dynamic emerging economies, must be boosted from current levels to address the infrastructure gap. The development of human capital, through better schooling and training, is also essential.
   BUSINESS CLIMATE and OVERALL GOVERNANCE - Improvements in these areas are also essential to harness private investment. This will require diverse efforts, ranging from trimming red tape to improving business security.
   EXTERNAL TRADE - Trade with the faster-growing economies can be deepened and exports can be diversified more generally to reduce over time reliance on advanced economies and commodity exports.
   Countries will also need to accomodate the demands of a growing middle class and increased global competition by upgrading the quality of services in the area of education, health and public security.
   These challenges must be met without compromising the sustainability of government finance, this will require boosting government revenue in some cases and being more careful about spending priorities in others.
   Policymakers will need to carefully manage the generally stimulative global conditions to avoid a recurrence of the boom-bust cycles of the past, while making new efforts to cement conditions for stronger and more equitable growth.

Vol. Teac. XII - Intentional Homicide Rate

  I would like to do a correction, I said that Brazil is among the top ten countries with the highest intentional homicide rate, but I was wrong, actually our country is among the top fifteen. Below is the list with the deadliest countries of the world, the data is from: UNODC, 2004.

              INTENTIONAL HOMICIDE RATE PER 100,000 POPULATION.

 1º South Africa  69.0                         9º Angola  36.0
  2º Colombia  61.1                          10º Burundi  35.4
 3º El Salvador  57.0                        11º Congo  35.2
  4º Jamaica  55.2                              12º Haiti  33.0
 5º Ivory Coast  45.7                        13º Honduras  32.2
  6º Lesotho  37.3                              14º Zimbabwe 32.0
 7º Venezuela  37.0                           15º Brazil  30.8
  8º Guatemala  36.4

   In Europe, the highest intentional homicide rate is from Russia 29.7, after comes Ukraine 12.0

   In this another list, the data is from: laspblog.blogspot.com,2008, is the highest homicide rate among the Brazilian state capitals, and the second list, the safest, in the source, there were not numbers for the safest.

      INTENTIONAL HOMICIDE RATE PER 100,000 POPULATION
              Highest                                     Lowest
       1º Maceio  101.6                         1º Palmas
       2º Recife  61.2                             2º Boa Vista
       3º Vitória  58.9                             3º Florianópolis
       4º Salvador  57.1                         4º Rio Branco
       5º Bélem  50.3                              5º Macapa

Vol. Teac. XII.- Deadliest Carnival on the Brazilian Roads

        I decided posted that report in this blog, because I was watching the TV news when I got knowing that this carnival was the deadliest ever recorded, since all the road`s accidents started to be monitored, there were 213 deaths on the Brazilians roads.
        Specialists said that this increase was due to the rainy weather, but the drivers knows that we are in the rainy season, so I think they should be prepared and drive with due care to this kind of weather, I think that the rain can not be used as a excuse to murder on roads, to the imprudent behavior.
         Sometimes the imprudenters is the own and only victim of their irresponsibility, but when it is not what happens, justice has to be done. I think some measure could be taken to low these so high dead`s rate in vehicule accidents in Brazil.
        More use of breathalyzer on roads and on streets with higher fines to the lawbreakers, the same for who drive above the speed limit or for who passes in forbidden place. Also, as we can see in the previous report, the pedestrians and motocyclists are half of the deadly victim in the traffic and we should demand more respect for them, the fragilest and vulnerable on roads and on streets.
         It is proved that the main cause of accidents is the excess of speed, so why there is no more radars on roads and streets, I think is essential to put these devices in the most dangerous places. Another measure that would be very useful is to build divided highway, at least in curves and in crossing or in urban pieces of the roads.With these measures, Brazil possibly will lose many positions in the deadliest traffic ranking.
        There is not a tragedy and crime like homicide, but, of course that a intentional murder is much worse.
         In both cases, Brazil is among the top ten countries with the highest death`s rate of the world.
   In my opinion, the lawmakers should watch how is the justice in more advanced countries and maybe they realized that murderes usually got a punishment a lot harder than other lawbreakers, consequently, murderes thinks more before to kill somebody.
         The life is short and everybody have the right to live longest as possible.

The law saves lives in the traffic.

    This report was published in Época magazine at 29th November 2010, and was written by Celso Masson, Alberto Cairo and Marco Vergotti. This is a summary and the title is above.

    The world day in memory of the victims of traffic, celebrated in the 21th november brought the launch forward of the decade of actions for the safety on vias criated by UNO(United Nations Organization).
    The target is to reduce the alarming world death rates caused by accidents on roads and on streets.
    The deaths in the traffic, were in 2004, the 9º cause of total of the deaths in the world, in 2030 could be the 5º cause in the ranking.
    In Brazil, the harden of laws since 1997,when was created the Brazilian traffic code, have shown positive results.
    Below, list of  the top ten countries with the deadliest traffic(deaths in the traffic by 100.000 vehicles).

    1º  Cambodia  1000,7                         6º  Mexico   68,1
    2º  Kenya   288,1                                7º  Brazil   67,3
    3º  Egypt   285,9                                 8º  China   61,6
    4º  India   145,4                                  9º  Vietnam   55,8
    5º  Russia   86,1                                 10º  Turkey   34,8

    Comparing national average of deaths with the numbers of deaths in each state, we can see that only four states and the DF stays below of the national average, the safest states are: 1º SP, 2º RS, 3º RJ, 4º SC. And two are around the national average: 5º MG, 6º PR. All the other states are above the national average and the top four states with the deadliest traffic are: 1º MA, 2º PI, 3º AL, 4º PA.
     In the same report, we can see that the percentagem of deaths in relation to total, shows that pedestrian 24,2% and motorcyclist 23,4% are almost half of the deads in the Brazilian traffic.

  

The Brazilian model.

      This report was published in the Economist.com at Nov,18th 2010 and was written by Schumpeter, this is a summary, the title is above.

      Brazil needs to be more innovative to fulfil its promise of being the ¨country of the future¨.
      Stand on the observation deck in Embraer`s final-assembly hangar in São José dos Campos and you can see the case for globalisation laid out below you. Five finished aircraft bear the insignia of airlines from across the world.
      Embraer turned itself around by spotting a market niche in medium-sized jets and by inventing new business models. It pioneered ¨reverse outsourcing¨,doing work of design and assembly itself and contracting out the making of parts to rich-world companies such as General Eletric.
      Embraer is a prime exhibit in a debate that is convulsing Brazilian business, about the country`s capacity to innovate. Brazil`s economy is expected to grow more than 7% this year. The country boast some of the World`s largest companies: Vale is the biggest producer of iron ore, AB Inbev is the biggest brewer and Marcopolo is a big producer of bus.
      But throw  the world ¨innovation¨ and businessmen become more philosophical. Brazil spends a paltry 1.1% of its GDP on R&D compared with 1.4% in China and 3.3% in Japan. Last year Brazil fell 18 places in Insead`s annual innovation index, from 50th to 68th. Worse still, its ratio of basic-product to manufactured-product exports was the highest since 1978. These figures confront Brazilians with a troubling question. Can their country become an innovator in its own right, or is its recent growth is little more than a by-product of China`s appetite for commodities?
     Optimists have more than just Embraer on their side. Natura Cosméticos is emerging as a giant by dint of clever marketing. Natura is also a master of what might be dubbed ¨lean innovation¨. About 40% of its revenues come from products introduced in the past two years. But the company has only 150 R&D staff compared with L`Oréal`s 2,800. Its trick is to form partnership with universities.
    Some of Brazil`s commodity giants have also managed to add brain to muscle. Petrobras is a leader in deep-sea oil production. Most Brazilian cars can run on a mixture of ethanol and petrol, thanks in part to the flex-fuel engine, developed in the country.
  Yet Brazil suffers from two blocks to growth: red tape and gaping inequality.Brazil comes 152nd in the World Bank`s ¨Doing Business¨ rankings for the ease of paying taxes(it took the hyphotetical medium-sized company 2,600 hours a year to comply with the tax code) and 128nd on the ease of starting a business.
   Brazilian companies are also doing far less than their rivals in India and China to master the art o producing goods for the masses. Clever ideas and products aimed at the poor abound in the country. But most of these innovators are foreign. Brazil`s own champions are applying much less ingenuity to producing goods for the local market than for the global one.