Brazil’s Economy Ministry raised its economic growth forecast for this year to 2.7%, from 2% forecast in July, after official data for the second quarter showed strong activity.
The ministry’s Economic Policy Secretariat said the revision comes after April-June GDP growth surprised expectations with a 1.2% increase. Activity will continue to expand in the second half, albeit more slowly, he added.
The central bank’s index of economic activity, a benchmark for gross domestic product, rose 1.17% in July from the previous month. Compared to the same month of the previous year, the activity grew by 3.87%, reported the entity.
Unemployment
In recent days the President received good news. Brazil’s jobless rate fell in August for the sixth consecutive month to its lowest level since 2015 as the labor market continued to recover. But not everything is rosy: the Informal work has skyrocketed for 13.1 million Brazilianswhich represent 39.8% of the active population.
Official data released on Friday showed unemployment fell to 8.9% in the three months ending in August, matching the median estimate of economists surveyed by Bloomberg. Bolsonaro took office with inflation of 11.6% and increased it to 13.2%. However, he managed to reduce it gradually. In this way, the number of unemployed fell to 9.7 million, the lowest level since December 2015, according to the latest data reported by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE)Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE) .
Other data
- The main stock market index, Bovespahas risen 25% since Bolsonaro came to power and 65% since the lows of the pandemic.
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Inflation it fell to 8.73% in August from 10.07% in July, below the euro zone and almost like the United States, where it was 8.3%. For the second month in a row, the country is in deflationthanks to the drop in fuel prices and the measures of the Central Bank, which started the cycle of interest rate hikes on time.
- A more indebted Brazil: debt equivalent to 77.6% of GDP last July) and will leave what economists have called “tax bomb”. Expenses are contained and exist social demands that will put pressure on the budget and the fiscal situation from the country. Recently, the President increased spending for the presidential elections.
- Hunger, a problem that got into the electoral campaign: 33.1 million Brazilians suffer from hunger. The figure, with an increase of 73% in the last two years, belongs to the Brazilian Network for Research on Food Sovereignty and Security (Penssan).
Leftist former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (2003-2010), a favorite in the polls, blames far-right president Jair Bolsonaro for Brazil’s reappearance on the UN “Hunger Map” in 2021: 28.9% of the population suffers from “moderate or severe food insecurity”.
The country had been removed from the registry in 2014, following an economic boom and social programs that helped lift 30 million people out of poverty during the Lula government. Bolsonaro strikes back, accusing the leftist of bankrupting Brazil through corruption.
Source: Ambito
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