The BRICS: some historical experiences, growth challenges and opportunities

The acronym BRICS was a fad among the media and global investors. Now, the acronym sounds passé. However, the group of countries remains important, from both political and economic reasons. They have a large aggregate size, 28% of the global GDP and 42% of the world’s population, high growth potential due to the current significant misallocation of resources and relatively low stock of human capital, structural transformation is in progress and one of them, China, is taking steps to become a global power and a challenger to the US dominance. This paper provides a brief overview of the five economies, Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. We focus on some aspects of their history, the Chinese initiatives in international finance and geopolitical strategic moves, their growth experience and structural transformation over the last 35 years, trade and investment integration into the global economy and among themselves, the growth challenges faced by their economies and the potential gains to the Brazilian economy from a stronger integration with the other BRICS. In association with its efforts to be a global power, China aims to become a major player in global finance and to achieve the status of global currency for the renminbi, which would be the first currency of an emerging economy to attain such position. Despite the similarities, the BRICS encompass very diverse economies. In the recent decades, China and India showed stellar growth rates. On the other hand, Brazil, Russia and South Africa have expanded just in line with global output growth with the Russian economy exhibiting high volatility. China is by far the largest economy, and South Africa the smallest, the only BRICS economy with a GDP lower than US$ 1 trillion. Russia abandoned communism almost 25 years ago, but reversed many of the privatizations of 90’s. China is still ruled by communism, but has a vibrant private sector and recently has officially declared market forces to play a dominant role in its economy. Brazil, Russia and South Africa are global natural resources powerhouses and commodity exporters while China and India are large commodity importers. Brazil is relatively closed to international trade of goods and services, in marked contrast to the other four economies. Brazil, India and South Africa are dependent on external capital flows whereas China and Russia are capital exporters. India and South Africa have younger populations and a large portion living below the poverty line. Despite its extraordinary growth experience that lifted many millions from poverty, China still has 28% of its population classified as poor. Russia and China have much older populations and one of their challenges is to deal with the effects of a declining labor force in the near future. India, China and South Africa face a long way to urbanization, while Brazil and Russia are already urbanized countries. China is an industrial economy but its primary sector still absorbs a large pool of workers. India is not, but the primary sector employs also a large share of the labor force. China’s aggregate demand structure is biased towards investment that has been driving its expansion. Brazil and South Africa have an aggregate demand structure similar to the developed economies, with private consumption accounting for approximately 70%. The same similarity applies to the supply side, as in both economies the share of services nears 70%. The development problem is a productivity problem, so microeconomic reforms are badly needed to foster long-term growth of the BRICS economies since they have lost steam due a variety of factors, but fundamentally due to slower total factor productivity growth. China and India are implementing ambitious reform programs, while Brazil is dealing with macroeconomic disequilibria. Russia and South Africa remain mute about structural reforms. There are some potential benefits to Brazil to be extracted from a greater economic integration with the BRICS, particularly in natural resources intensive industries and services. Necessary conditions to the materialization of those gains are the removal of the several sources of resource misallocation and strong investment in human capital.

Financiamento ao comércio internacional de commodities : financiamento às exportações brasileiras sob modalidade de recebimento antecipado de exportação

O presente trabalho tem por objeto analisar aspectos jurídicos relacionados com o financiamento internacional do comércio de commodities, com dedicada atenção ao chamado “financiamento pré-exportação” (ou pre-export finance). Considerando a relevância dessa operação ao fomento das exportações brasileiras, admitida pelas autoridades monetárias como “Recebimento Antecipado de Exportação”, ter-se-á como objetivo a análise dos instrumentos jurídicos que, recepcionados pela legislação brasileira ou socialmente tipificados, têm como premissa a implementação de estruturas contratuais e de garantias voltadas para a eliminação de riscos em operações transfronteiriças com economias emergentes, como o Brasil. Esses instrumentos são empregados nas diversas fases do financiamento estruturado de commodities, impondo aos seus agentes – financiadores, executivos e advogados – desafios relacionados com obrigações, riscos, responsabilidades, garantias e contingências pouco exploradas pela literatura jurídica. O tema será desenvolvido em nove capítulos. O primeiro conceituará as diversas modalidades de operações de trade finance; o segundo dedicará análise para as operações estruturadas de financiamento do comércio de commodities; o terceiro tratará dos parâmetros de racionalidades (como análises conjugadas de balanço contábil, fluxo de caixa e mobilização de bens) adotados pelos financiadores estrangeiros para a concessão do crédito ao exportador; o quarto será reservado ao estudo criterioso dos riscos da operação e sua mitigação; o quinto discutirá as características principais do financiamento pré-exportação; o sexto será dedicado aos aspectos regulatórios, conceito, características e campo de aplicação do “Recebimento Antecipado de Exportação”; o sétimo analisará os aspectos contratuais inerentes à operação de financiamento pré-exportação; o oitavo e o nono serão dedicados ao estudo das garantias, sobretudo no que diz respeito à preservação de bens e direitos outorgados em garantia, com vistas ao reembolso do capital ao financiador estrangeiro. Sob esse prisma, serão analisados os principais elementos do financiamento estruturado à exportação brasileira de commodities, a fim de contribuir com o aprimoramento e a divulgação dessas técnicas empresariais e jurídicas (ainda restritas a um público especialíssimo) engendradas em prol do desenvolvimento econômico brasileiro.

The manufacturing industry in Brazil in the era of global value chains

This article presents a comprehensive and detailed overview of the international trade performance of the manufacturing industry in Brazil over the last decades, emphasizing its participation in Global Value Chains. It uses information from recent available global inputoutput tables such as WIOD (World Input-output database) and TIVA (Trade in Value Added, OECD) as well as complementary information from the GTAP 8 (Global Trade Analysis Project) database. The calculation of a broad set of value added type indicators allows a precise contextualization of the ongoing structural changes in the Brazilian industry, highlighting the relative isolation of its manufacturing sector from the most relevant international supply chains. This article also proposes a public policy discussion, presenting two case studies: the first one related to trade facilitation and the second one to preferential trade agreements. The main conclusions are twofold: first, the reduction of time delays at customs in Brazil may significantly improve the trade performance of its manufacturing industry, specially for the more capital intensive sectors which are generally the ones with greater potential to connection to global value chains; second, the extension of the concept of a “preferential trade partner” to the context of the global unbundling of production may pave the way to future trade policy in Brazil, particularly in the mapping of those partners whose bilateral trade relations with Brazil should receive greater priority by policy makers

WTO - Market and non market economies: the hybrid case of Chine

This article will discuss the systemic challenges of integrating hybrid economies, and their NME features, into the WTO. It will analyze how the Multilateral Trading System has dealt differently with the issue with the issue during the GATT and the WTO eras. It will then discuss the relationship between NMEs and the principles and rules of the multilateral trading system

Sistemas de regulação do comércio internacional em confronto: o marco dos estados e o marco das transnacionais

This article revisits a past article by the authors in which they propose a new methodology for analyzing trade issues, cross-cutting through the three ―layers‖ of international trade regulation: so-called multisystem of trade regulation. In this text the authors include another approach to international trade regulation studies, proposing a better understanding of the influence of transnational enterprises in the shaping of modern internal trade. In this sense, the transnationals are not only influencing international trade regulation through lobbying in traditional fora (especially in plurilateral and preferential trade agreements), but they are also becoming sources of their own private regulations, particularly regarding private standards. In this sense, the study of international trade regulation must take into account the activities and interests of these indispensible actors, critically analyzing the differences between the regulatory logic of states against the one keen to transnationals

WTO: challenges for the next 20

International trade is facing some significant challenges: a serious deadlock to conclude the last round of the multilateral negotiation at the WTO, the fragmentation of trade rules by the multiplication of preferential and mega agreements, the arrival of a new model of global production and trade leaded by global value chains that is threatening the old trade order, and the imposition of new sets of regulations by private bodies commanded by transnationals to support global value chains and non-governmental organizations to reflect the concerns of consumers in the North. The lack of any multilateral order in this new regulation is creating a big cacophony of rules and developing a new regulatory war

Barreiras regulatórias: um novo desafio para a governança da OMC

Over the last decades, there is an increasing concern around what should be the role played by the World Trade Organization before the proliferation of preferential and plurilateral trade agreements (PTAs). Moreover, the expansion of the trade agenda through issues not encompassed by the WTO agreements, such as sustainability and global value chains led to a process of fragmentation of international trade law, strengthening the false idea that there would be a complete antagonism between preferentialism and multilateralism. As tariff preferences have diminished in importance, non-tariff measures as domestic regulation have become relatively more significant as determinants of market access and the conditions of competition. Given this equation, and regarding the importance to safeguard the progress achieved by the multilateral trade system, the present article seeks to elucidate some points considered relevant to the regulatory barriers subject and, therefore, address the role that can be attributed to the WTO as a key to effective governance of trade regulatory cooperation

Reach: is such regulation WTO consistent?

This present study analyses the Regulation on Chemicals of the European Union – so called REACH, and some of its main features. Technical barriers to trade have become the new instrument of distorting international trade benefits and creating protection for domestic industry, on the basis of protection of human health and the environment. It aims at identifying REACH’s most primary and controversial element and its consistency under the World Trade Organization System, in context of the Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade

Complexidade das exportações e produtividade: uma análise do caso brasileiro

No contexto do desenvolvimento econômico, este trabalho tem como principal objetivo explorar a relação entre comércio internacional e produtividade. Após fazer uma ampla discussão sobre as teorias do comércio internacional e as teorias do desenvolvimento econômico, busca-se definir a relação de causalidade entre essas duas variáveis. A pergunta que se segue refere-se ao sentido da causalidade, ou seja, produtividade gera comércio ou comércio gera produtividade? Esse trabalho sugere que os dois sentidos são possíveis e a diferença encontra-se justamente no componente da produtividade que está sendo analisado. Assim, produtividade, no nível do produto (intrasetorial) gera comércio, tal como argumentam Smith (1776) e Ricardo (1817), mas comércio gera produtividade (intersetorial) tal como argumentam Hausmann, Hwang e Rodrik (2007) e McMillan e Rodrik (2011). Na sequência, o estudo faz uma ampla análise dos métodos de decomposição da produtividade, concluindo que existe mais de uma forma de se fazer essa decomposição e que a interpretação de cada uma dessas abordagens difere podendo enviesar as conclusões. Adicionalmente, é feita a decomposição da produtividade nos seus componentes utilizando duas bases de dados distintas: 10-Sector Database do GGDC e contas nacionais do IBGE, concluindo que, a depender da base, os resultados encontrados podem variar significativamente. Da mesma forma, dentro de uma abordagem estruturalista, diferenciam-se setores que possuem maior potencial de crescimento de setores tradicionais com menor potencial de crescimento. Definindo a complexidade das exportações a partir do conceito desenvolvido por Hausmann at al (2014), estimam-se para o caso brasileiro recente, através de um modelo de painel dinâmico, os coeficientes de uma equação para explicar variações no efeito intersetorial estático da produtividade. O modelo estimado sugere que a complexidade das exportações impacta significativa e positivamente o componente estrutural da produtividade. Assim, pode-se dizer que uma pauta de exportações com produtos mais sofisticados favorece o crescimento da produtividade via seu componente intersetorial.