The Vice President of Brazil begins a three-day official visit to Portugal this Monday, with a very tight schedule of meetings with the President of the Republic, the Prime Minister, the President of Parliament and the Executive Secretary of the CPLP, as well as businessmen.
This is the first official visit of the Brazilian vice president to Portugal, who will finish his term in January, when the new government, headed by Lula da Silva, the elected president, takes office.
This visit begins two days after Lula da Silva finished his trip to Portugal as president-elect of Brazil. According to a statement issued this Saturday by the office of Hamilton Mourão, in the Community of Portuguese Language Countries (CPLP) the vice president will participate in a meeting with the executive secretary of the organization, Zacarias da Costa, and in a formal session with the representatives representatives of the nine member states of the organization, including Brazil.
On the first day of the official visit to Portugal, which takes place between November 21 and 24, Hamilton Mourão will have an audience with the Portuguese President, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, in the afternoon at the Belém Palace.
On the second day, Hamilton Mourão will meet with the Portuguese Prime Minister, António Costa, in the morning, in the early afternoon he will visit the Consulate General of Brazil in Lisbon and then he will meet with the President of the Assembly of the Republic, Augusto Santos Silva.
On Wednesday morning there will be a meeting with Brazilian and Portuguese businessmen and the afternoon is dedicated to meetings at the CPLP.
According to the note, the bilateral relationship between the two countries, based on historical and affective ties, is based on a “solid political, economic and cultural association, as well as coordination in international forums.”
On Thursday, the Brazilian vice president no longer has a schedule, returning to his country early in the morning, on a flight that will depart from the Figo Maduro military airport.
Brazil is now one of the main suppliers of raw materials and intermediate goods for the Portuguese industry, the note also mentions. And “with this, the profile of Brazilian exports is changing: products such as coffee, timber, sugar, leather and cocoa, which dominated in the past, are giving way to other ‘commodities,’” he points out.
According to the statement, in 2021, the list of Brazilian exports is mainly made up of crude oil (62% of the total), soybeans (9%), corn (4.4%) and rolled iron or steel products (3.8% ).
On the side of Brazilian imports, in 2021 vegetable fats and oils (37%), alcoholic beverages (9.6%), fillets and other fish meats (5.6%), aircraft and their components (5.2%) and other manufacturing industries products (4.7%).
“The Brazil-Portugal trade exchange reached 3.5 billion dollars (about 4.8 billion euros) from January to October 2022, which represents a growth of 56% compared to the same period last year”, being the Portuguese market the 18th destination of Brazilian exports.
In addition, the note advances, it is estimated that there are around 600 companies with Portuguese capital operating in Brazil, and Portugal ranks 14th among the countries of origin of foreign direct investment in that country.
Source: Observadora
