Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro said there is a vast investment potential for UAE businesses in Brazil as the country pushes ahead with new strategic policies and projects.
He made his remarks during the Global Business Forum (GBF) Latin America 2022, held on the sidelines of Expo 2020 Dubai.
The fourth edition of the forum, organized by Dubai Chamber of Commerce in partnership with Expo 2020 Dubai, kicked off on Wednesday and brought together heads of state, ministers, government officials and prominent business leaders from the UAE and Latin America at the Dubai Exhibition Center.
In his virtual speech, Bolsonaro invited UAE companies to invest in Brazil and explore the attractive business opportunities that are emerging across a variety of economic sectors.
He assured them that fiscal irresponsibility and spendthrift ways would no longer thwart business opportunities in his country, adding that foreign investors can renew their confidence in Brazil’s economy.
“We are committed to Brazil’s economic openness, comprising a competitive insertion of our country in the new scenario that will mark the post-pandemic world,” he said.
“After all the challenges of the past two years, which have led us to direct a huge amount of resources to prevent a more severe social and economic downturn, Brazil has resumed the path of economic growth.”
Bolsonaro affirmed that his country has been carrying out the largest infrastructure investment program in its history and one of the largest in the world.
He told the delegates that besides Brazil’s endeavors of cautious and sustainable economic recovery, the government has transferred in the past three years 131 assets to the private sector.
“This brought about more than $150 billion in investments and around $25 billion dollars in concession fees.”
He said that the program’s portfolio for 2022 comprises 153 assets, with forecast investments reaching up to $60 billion.
President of Dubai Chamber Abdulaziz al-Ghurair, for his part, said that Latin America will be a key focus for Dubai’s ambitious strategy of boosting foreign trade to $544 billion within the next five years.
He pointed out that for the first-nine months of 2021, Dubai’s imports from Latin America stood at $4.8 billion.
The 27 countries in the Latin America and Caribbean regions offer a wealth of untapped potential, Ghurair noted, underlining the importance of bolstering cooperation with them and pushing towards economic integration and reforms to create a new growth prospective.
