Brazil is organizing a trade mission to visit various African countries. According to the Brazilian Minister of Development, Industry, and Foreign Trade, Luiz Fernando Furlan, during President Lula’s trip last week to five African countries, the government gathered information to guide the mission.
“We are organizing a specific mission to two or three African countries, including Nigeria, with entrepreneurs from sectors that will be selected beforehand as the ones that hold out the most promising business prospects,” he informed.
Furlan said that representatives of the Brazilian government met with their African counterparts, from whom they obtained trade data which is being cross-checked with the Ministry’s data to define the goals of the mission:
“The idea is to assign priority to countries with which Brazil currently runs a trade deficit. Algeria and Nigeria, for example.”
In the case of Nigeria, the Ministry’s data indicate a Brazilian trade deficit of nearly US$ 3 billion in 2004. Brazil exported US$ 505 million and imported US$ 3.490 billion. Most of Brazil’s imports from Nigeria last year consisted of crude oil.
Furlan informed that the intention is to create a compensation program, like the one set up between the two countries in the 1970’s.
Agência Brasil