Guedes says Brazil Aid and investments will help the tough 2022 economy

Minister Paulo Guedes (Economy) said this Thursday (16) that 2022 will be a difficult year, with growth affected by the increase in interest rates, but that the Brazilian Aid and investments will help the activity.

“Yes, it will be a difficult year, but be careful with the forecasts. If they were wrong three times, they could be wrong four. It’s just a matter of becoming a little more moderate, a little more relaxed, depoliticizing the interpretation of economic data a little bit,” he declared in an interview with press after the PPI (Investment Partnership Program) board meeting, in which he did not remain for the question session.

According to Guedes, economists know that the fight against inflation raises interest rates and generates a slowdown, slowdown and emptying of the cyclical recovery. For him, the V-turn is complete and the question is what will be seen from now on in terms of growth.

“Next year will be the result of two vectors. On the one hand, the fight against inflation; on the other hand, the rate of investments is systematically increasing, the expansion of our investment programs and also the Auxílio Brasil – which is a strong program for transfer of income to 17 million families. This consumption will be heated and, on the other hand, investment is also heating up,” he said.

Guedes has intensified the discourse on private investments, which were even presented to potential interested parties recently during President Jair Bolsonaro’s trip to the Middle East.

He stated that the investment rate (considering public and private resources) is at the highest point since 2013, at 19.4%. “This means a reactivation of investments like there hasn’t been since 2013. Every year it’s going up a little more. And not only are we investing a lot more, but in this entire frontier of sanitation, natural gas, oil, airports, ports, railways, highways, fishing terminals, environmental assets,” he said.

For Guedes, the private sector is reacting and has the capacity to invest more than the public sector. The minister cited figures compiled by the Special Secretariat of the PPI to say that, in the period from 2019 to December 2021, a total of R$ 822.3 billion in investments will be contracted.

The duration of the contracts and the execution of these investments, however, can take decades. The 22 airports auctioned in April, for example, have a 30-year concession period.

Martha Seillier, special secretary of the PPI, said that there was no separate amount of investments for 2022, but said that most of them are concentrated in the initial phases. “Most of the investments we are talking about are concentrated in the first five years [de contrato]”, he said.

The effort to show investment numbers contrasts with government frustrations in part of the agenda.

Seillier admitted that one of the main objectives of the government, the privatization of Correios, should not receive approval yet in 2021. The project is in the CAE (Economic Affairs Commission) of the Senate.

“We expected to approve this project this year. [Mas] because of the calendar of other votes, this will probably go to next year,” he said.

“To be able to move forward with privatization next year, we need to move forward with this bill in the Senate between March and April, the deadline for forwarding the bill to TCU –which also needs time to analyze the bill–, and then still we have to publish the notice. We still have a window for approval of the bill in the Senate, and we believe in the approval,” he said.

Another privatization expected by the government for 2022 is that of Eletrobras. The process was the subject of a request for inspection by the TCU (Court of Accounts of the Union), but even so, the technicians plan to proceed with the procedures.

“The decision at the TCU was to follow the current schedule for this public offering to take place in the first four months of 2022, and the only issue associated with the vote, which will certainly return to the plenary in January 2022, is that the celebration of the concession contracts only take place after deliberation by the TCU plenary. The other stages of Eletrobras’ capitalization were maintained and we are continuing”, said Marisete Fátima Dadald Pereira, executive secretary of the Ministry of Mines and Energy.

The technicians’ interview was given after a meeting of the Investment Partnership Program Council (CPPI), composed of the President of the Republic, ministers and presidents of state banks. This Thursday, the collegiate approved the inclusion in the PPI of projects such as the road tunnel that connects Santos to Guarujá, cities on the São Paulo coast.

Projects for a terminal at the port of São Francisco do Sul (SC), a terminal at the port of Rio Grande (RS) and two energy transmission auctions were also included.

The projects included in the PPI are treated as a priority by the federal government and the bodies involved must act so that they evolve efficiently and economically.