Brazil Faces New Oil-Boom Curse as the World’s Resource Engine

In 2007, Brazilian geologists made the biggest oil find in the Americas in three decades. Buried more than five miles below sea-level, the discovery was estimated to raise the country’s crude reserves by 62 percent.

Brazil was already the world’s natural resource powerhouse: its biggest exporter of coffee, sugar, orange juice and beef. The prospect of it becoming a major energy power as well prompted then-President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva to declare amid a rush of patriotism that “God is Brazilian.”