BNDES will have a program to finance exports, says Alckmin at Fiesp

The vice-president and minister of Industry and Commerce, Geraldo Alckmin, said this Monday (16th), at Fiesp (Federation of Industries of São Paulo), that the BNDES (National Bank for Economic and Social Development) will have a program to finance exports.

According to Alckmin, the volume of business with the neighboring country dropped from US$ 28 billion to US$ 15 billion and that one of the reasons for this drop comes from the financing made by countries like China to favor this type of negotiation.

“Argentina is Brazil’s third largest trading partner and is where we sell most manufactured products,” he said. Among the measures foreseen by the BNDES, according to the minister, are the resumption of work by a bipartite commission between Brazil and the neighboring country.

Financing for importers, said the vice-president, is part of the triad defined by the president of the BNDES, Aloizio Mercadante, for the mandate, which also includes the true economy and innovation, the latter through digitalization. According to Alckmin, “the BNDES can look for resources abroad”.

“It’s important to have a program to help exports because we’re talking about jobs within the country. Foreign trade is extremely important, increasingly relevant, and everything we can do to strengthen it, and it’s not just exports, it’s imports too, [vamos fazer].”

In front of the Fiesp directorate in São Paulo, Alckmin also said that President Lula “has already said that he will not revoke either the labor reform or the social security reform.” Maintaining the changes made to labor legislation in 2017 was one of the requests made by the president of Fiesp, Josué Gomes, when opening the meeting.

It was during the management of Michel Temer (MDB), president of Fiesp’s superior council of national and political studies, that the labor reform was approved in the National Congress.

Josué said that the industrial sector agrees to discuss improving the current rules, but defended the importance of not “going back to points in the past that were advances”. “We are open [a discutir]as long as there is no regression.”

Alckmin also defended the importance of approving a tax reform. According to him, it is necessary to take advantage of the legitimacy of the first year of the mandate to put to the vote a PEC (proposed amendment to the Constitution) that reorganizes the tax system in Brazil, which he classified as a “tax cipoal”.

The PECs demand a qualified quorum to be approved, with 2/3 of the parliamentarians.

Last week, the possibility of repealing the 35% cut of the IPI (Tax on Industrialized Products) put industry and service sectors on alert, as this was even put on the agenda of the Minister of Finance, Fernando Haddad , as one of the measures that would be included in the fiscal package announced last week.

“There was the possibility of canceling the 35% reduction. We managed to cancel that, it was not incorporated and the next goal is to end the IPI, and ending the IPI is the tax reform.”

Josué is a great industrialist, great leadership, says Alckmin

The vice-president came to Fiesp on a decisive day for the entity’s president, Josué Gomes. This Monday, the federation meets in an assembly that could end with the dismissal of Gomes.

Questioned whether he would support the permanence of the president of the São Paulo federation, Alckmin said that the matter was an internal one at Fiesp, but he stressed that he had “enormous appreciation” for him.

“Josué is a great industrialist, great leader. I hope this is resolved soon, it is important to be united. We are going to strengthen this bond with Fiesp so that we can walk towards the recovery of the industry, added value, employment and higher wages.”