Brazil’s Economy Minister forecasts 5% growth for 2021

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Brazil’s Minister of Economy, Paulo Guedes, increased growth forecasts for 2021 and said on Tuesday, July 13, that the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is heading towards an expansion “around 5%” this year.

That estimate improves by half a percentage point the expectations that the Ministry of Economy itself and the Central Bank held until now and, according to Guedes, is supported by the improvement that various economic indicators have experienced in recent weeks.

“The Brazilian economy is coming back much faster than expected,” the minister declared in reference to the hard blow that the country’s GDP suffered last year when it collapsed by 4.1% as a consequence of the coronavirus pandemic, which has not yet ceased in Brazil. However, it has lost intensity in recent weeks.

Without specifying data, Guedes said that “all regions of the country are creating new jobs”, that “tax collection is growing again,” and that the Brazilian economy is heading to “surprise the world” with its resilience.

Guedes was speaking at a ceremony led by the country’s president, Jair Bolsonaro. A law was sanctioned allowing the privatization of the electricity company Eletrobras through a capitalization process to reduce the State’s share in its corporate composition to less than 50%.

According to the minister, the privatization of this company, which is the largest in the sector in Latin America, will allow it to increase its investment and energy generation capacity, with which it will be able to “keep up with the pace that the growth of the economy will demand”.

Bolsonaro, in a brief statement, ratified his government’s plans to move forward with the privatization process, which he reiterated will make the economy more dynamic and, above all, put a stop to corruption in state-owned companies.

The President expressed his confidence that the next step in this process will be the privatization of the Post Office, “to continue advancing towards a country with less State, with more freedom and free initiative”.

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