By Lise Alves, Senior Contributing Reporter
SÃO PAULO, BRAZIL – Brazil’s President, Michel Temer, urged investors on Monday not to let minor issues or news dissuade them from investing in the country. According to the President ‘institutional instabilities’ are temporary and will soon dissipate.
According to Temer, foreign capital is eager to apply in Brazil, but since Brazil ‘does not have very solid institutions, these (issues/news) shake institutions’.
“So the investor gets a little scared, be it the national investor, and much more, the foreign investor. But these instabilities are fleeting. And they cannot be taken seriously,” urged President Temer.
President Temer, along Brazil’s Minister of Transparency, Torquato Jardim, and political scientist, Murillo Aragão, spoke with approximately eighty foreign and Brazilian businessmen and members of the financial market guaranteeing that there are various activities to be invested in that ‘will not disappoint you’.
In September President Temer went to New York to speak to U.S. businessmen about opportunities in the South American country. Temer stated at the time that his administration was developing a plan to expand public-private partnerships and implement measures to make investments in Brazil more attractive to foreign capital.
Among the measures taken in these six months of the Temer administration, was the lifting of participation requirement by Brazilian oil giant, Petrobras. Days after the announcement Royal Dutch Shell executives announced plans to invest R$10 billion in the country in the next four years.
Political scientist Aragão praised measures announced by the government so far, such as the proposal that limits public spending and the educational reform. “Looking at everything that is happening today, I can not help but be cautiously optimistic,” said Aragão.
“The recovery of Brazil’s economic credibility will take time, but today we are taking a much more appropriate path,” he added.