Bolsonaro’s Plan to Reactivate Brazil’s Stagnating Military Industry

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – The eighth-largest exporter of defense products in the world in the 1980s, Brazil has relinquished its military industry in recent decades and has dropped to 60th position, according to the Brazilian Association of Defense and Security Materials Industry (ABIMDE).

But Jair Bolsonaro’s administration aims to resume this military commitment and place the country among the top 10 exporters of arms and military products, in a market worth about US$1.5 trillion.

According to data from the Ministry of Defense, in 2019 Brazil exported US$1.3 billion from the military industry, already exceeding the total exported in 2018 (US$915 million – a number that also corresponds to the annual average of the last decade).

To help the country achieve this goal, the Ministry of Defense has developed initiatives such as the Defense Articulation and Equipment Plan (PAED) and the incentive to the Defense Industrial Base (IDB), the group of state or private companies that take part in one or more of the research, development, production, distribution and maintenance stages of strategic defense products.

The goal in the short term is to reach US$6 billion in military material exported per year.

For the full picture, see our Brazil Tax Reform: Complete Guide.