Brazil’s unemployment rate fell 28.7 percent during President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva’s seven-year administration, according to a study released by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE) Thursday.
The unemployment rate averaged 8.1 percent last year, up from 7.9 percent in 2008. The increase is attributed to the impact of the international financial crisis on the country’s economy, which lowered job growth in the first half of the year.
Despite the crisis, the unemployment rate in 2009 was lower than the ones registered from 2003 to 2007. (more…)
President Lula announces his attendance at the UN climate conference.
The World Economic Forum has honored Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva for his “global statesmanship”-a ceremony the leader couldn’t attend for health reasons.
Brazilian Foreign Minister Celso Amorim received the award Friday on Silva’s behalf and read out a speech by the president, who said he viewed the honor as an “award for Brazil.”
Silva canceled his trip to the Davos conference on Wednesday night after suffering hypertension. He was hospitalized overnight in Brazil and released Thursday.
The forum said the award was for Silva’s eight years of model leadership. A former union leader who went to work as a child, Silva rose to become the country’s 35th president in 2003 and has presided over an economic resurgence in Brazil.
The president of Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is resting at his private home in São Bernardo do Campo, in the Greater São Paulo, after having suffered a high blood pressure peak on Wednesday which forced him to cancel his trip to the World Economic Forum in Davos where he was to be honoured with the Global Statesman Prize.
After a hectic week of ceremonies, visits and interviews Lula was preparing to fly to Switzerland when his personal doctor who had checked him several times for what seemed flu symptoms and chest and throat pains, decided he should not travel and had him interned in the local hospital of Recife, northeast of Brazil. (more…)
Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva
Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the president of Brazil, is considering supporting a renowned banker such as Central Bank president Henrique Meirelles, to complete his Workers Party ticket for next October’s presidential election which is expected to be headed by cabinet chief Dilma Rousseff, according to press reports in São Paulo.
Daily O Estado de S. Paulo reports that Lula told his closest collaborators he would favor Meirelles with the purpose of sending a “strong message” to calm investors and markets.
Rio’s Christ the Redeemer’s statue, considered one of the seven new wonders of the world, which receives annually 1.8 million visitors, starting this week will undergo a facelift, according to Brazilian Catholic church sources.
Renovations of the 40-meter (131-foot) high statue on the summit of the Corcovado hill (700 meters - 2,300 feet - above sea level), an iconic sight in the heart of Rio do Janeiro will cost US$ 3.8 million and take until June to complete. (more…)
