Plans to improve Brazil's travel infrastructure unveiled

Date: 16/8/2012

The Brazilian government has launched a campaign to attract 133 billion reais (£42 billion) of investment into the country's travel infrastructure.

It is part of a bid to improve road and rail links in the South American country ahead of the World Cup to be held there in 2014 and the Olympics in 2016, reports Reuters.

Brazil has a growing economy, but suffers from aging and overburdened infrastructure which will need to be updated before an influx of extra visitors for these major sporting events.

This batch of concessions is the largest ever to be launched by Brazil, which is in need of good transport links as the country itself is the size of some continents and therefore it is time consuming to travel across.

Average economic growth in Brazil has been at four per cent for the majority of the last ten years and President Dilma Rousseff hopes that renewed infrastructure will help to drive it forward.

She said: "We will continue to fulfil our role as the driver of development."

Ms Rousseff went on to say that investment in infrastructure would make the country richer and stronger, as well as being more modern and competitive.

There are currently a number of bottlenecks within the Brazilian economy, which cause problems when doing businesses, so by clearing these many firms will find their costs reduced.

Poor road infrastructure which is currently in place in Brazil means that goods and services take longer to transport than they need to.

This in turn leads to greater fuel costs, warehouse and more labour hours, meaning local businesses are less competitive in the international market.

Paulo Resende, Professor of Logistics and Dean at the Fundação Dom Cabral, a business school in the southeastern state of Minas Gerais, said: "Concessions have to be granted from a market perspective, not a social perspective.

"Investors need to know they can afford and follow through on the bids they make."

Posted by Nick Anderson

International Transport News and Sustainable Transport News