Summary

Agriculture – The federal government’s program Mais Alimentos [More Food], which subsidizes the purchase of farming equipment for small producers, has contributed to significantly increase the productivity of family farming and to boost the small tractors manufacturing industry.

Energy – Worldwide the use of solar energy has been growing by 70% to 80% a year. In Brazil, a country that does not produce photovoltaic panels –which transform the light of the Sun into electric current–, tapping into solar energy is mainly done by solar collectors, which are used to heat water.

Vehicles
• With a fleet of 60 million vehicles and mostly clean energy sources, Brazil can occupy an outstanding place in the development of the electric car. Yet today it seems that mainstreaming such technology interests more energy-generating companies than automakers.
• In Brazil, iron and steel scrap companies are the main destination of vehicles whose useful life has expired, since there is no legislation regulating and stimulating their recycling.
• In the year 2009, the production of motorcycles slowed down 33.8%, after a long period of growth. Credit facilities and especially the country’s enormous potential for this type of vehicle, however, have contributed to bring back optimism to this market, which is beginning to react.

Security – The electronic security industry –both manufacturing and services–, whose performance had already been quite robust over the last years, forecasts an even brighter future thanks to the 2014 Soccer World Cup and the 2016 Olympics.

Shipbuilding – The shipbuilding industry’s performance has been good thanks to the Program for the Modernization and Expansion of the Transpetro Fleet and to the beginning of the construction of the Atlântico Sul Shipyard (EAS, from the Portuguese acronym), the hemisphere’s largest and most modern facility of its kind.

Indigenous peoples – The Rio Silveira Guarani Indian Reservation, located on the coast of São Paulo, is going through a good moment. Child mortality rates have plummeted, the reservation’s area has been expanded and is beginning to be demarcated, and the local school has started to offer secondary instruction.

Memory – A brief history of young heroes, comrades of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, who crossed the Atlantic and the gigantic Brazilian coastline aboard fragile aircraft, thus guaranteeing the postal union between Europe and South America, and left records of their passage on the beaches of Santa Catarina.

Education – Originally created as a means to assess educational policies, gradually Brazil’s National Secondary Education Examination has come to encompass other purposes, among them to serve as a college-admission evaluation tool. Specialists, however, diverge as to the efficacy of the changes adopted.

Environment – Unlike what happened at the United Nations Conference on Climate Change, whose participants were unable to reach an agreement to reduce GHG emissions, the city and the state of São Paulo have managed to set reduction targets.

History – One hundred years ago, a sailor with the Brazilian Navy commanded a rebellion that became known as the Revolta da Chibata [Revolt of the Whip]. The rebellion was sparked by the widespread discontent among the crew stemming from the ill-treatment and physical punishment bestowed upon them by the officers.

Religiousness – Though not recognized as a saint by the Catholic Church, Saint George has a legion of faithful among Brazilians. His biggest shrine is in Rio de Janeiro, where his prestige obfuscates even the city’s patron saint, Saint Sebastian.

Folk music – Singer and composer Adoniran Barbosa, whose birth centennial is celebrated in 2010, was the samba musician who identified the most with the city of São Paulo, as shown by the events the city organized to honor him after his death in 1982.

Thematic panel – Francisco Barbosa is an economist who specialized in the analysis of economic fluctuations. He spoke about that at the Economics, Sociology and Politics Council of the São Paulo State Fecomercio, Sesc and Senac, advocating the idea that all crises are short, what takes time is the recovery. In his opinion, the country’s great problem is lack of growth.