Brazil Needs More Than Green Energy to Thrive
Latin America’s biggest economy needs a more resilient and diverse energy grid to spark a real economic recovery.
No water, no lights.
Photographer: Norberto Duarte/AFP via Getty Images
Record joblessness (14.7%) and underemployment? Deepening poverty and a recrudescent pandemic that has already killed 465,000? No worries, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro and his Panglossian loyalists see no way but up. Could they be on to something? Indeed, Brazil’s economy is stirring, thanks to booming agribusiness and surging prices for oil and minerals. Several banks have revamped their numbers, forecasting at least a 4% expansion of gross domestic product this year. “The economy will reelect Bolsonaro,” Fernando Bezerra, Bolsonaro’s leading man in the Senate said. But don’t be fooled.
“It doesn’t take much for Brazil to grow by 3% or 4%, especially after a sharp fall,” said Evandro Buccini, an economist at Rio Bravo, an asset management house. A sustained recovery is another matter: For that, Brazil will need less hubris and a mighty helping of divine intervention.