The Brazilian Competitiveness Cliff

Otaviano Canuto, Matheus Cavallari () and José Guilherme Reis ()
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Matheus Cavallari: World Bank
José Guilherme Reis: World Bank

World Bank - Economic Premise, 2013, issue 105, 1-8

Abstract: Brazilian exports of goods and services have grown sharply in recent years, with sales nearly three times higher in 2010 than in 2000. However, Brazil faces considerable competitiveness challenges: its export performance depends mostly on favorable geographical and sector composition effects. Such challenges increased after the recent global economic crisis. A recent slowdown in industrial exports, production, and investments seems related to supply-side difficulties stemming from a wide range of inefficiencies and rising costs, rather than insufficient demand. Although a stronger currency is one of the factors behind the lower competitiveness of Brazil’s manufacturing exports, sluggish productivity performance, lack of dynamism at the firm level, and a real wage uptrend seem to explain a significant part of the overall loss of competitiveness. This diagnostic reinforces the urgency of resuming the agenda of microeconomic reforms, increasing the investment-to–gross domestic product (GDP) ratio, and advancing toward better-skilled human capital.

JEL-codes: D0 F1 F4 F5 J3 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2013
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

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Related works:
Working Paper: The Brazilian Competitiveness Cliff (2013)
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