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Summary
Economics – Comparisons between the 1929 economic crisis and the one that broke out in late 2008 are inevitable. The changes that took place in the world over this 80-year period, however, have placed the developing nations, like Brazil, in better shape, this time, to overcome the difficulties.
Agrarian issue – The Brazilian government has been adopting measures to ensure a less predatory exploitation of the Amazon region. Among them, one of the most important is the legal regularization of the lands occupied mainly by crop and cattle farming.
Espírito Santo state – With a development model based on the production and export of commodities, Espírito Santo runs the risk of becoming one of Brazil’s states most affected by the effects of the present world economic crisis.
Tourism – The northeastern region of Brazil is becoming a magnet for foreign investments in the tourism industry. Large-scale developments, however, have found it difficult to deal with the agencies in charge of issuing environmental licenses.
Infrastructure – Lack of investments and negligence by the authorities are responsible for Brazil’s poor sanitation conditions. Actually, more than half of the population of the country has no access to sewage collection systems.
Consumer defense – Since the end of 2008, consumer call center services are subject to new rules. This sector, which generated upward of R$ 5 billion in revenues last year and employs more than 800,000 people, is also a cause for recurrent complaints.
Agriculture – The Peasant University, a project sponsored by the Federal University of Campina Grande, is changing the life of many people in Paraíba state’s outback. With guidance and supervision, rural communities have been adopting sustainable methods of production and achieving good results.
Urbanization – According to a study commissioned by the United Nations, the world’s urban population has been growing at a faster pace than that of the rural ones. This is due to the attraction exerted by cities, as they offer better opportunities for development, although cities often do not have the structure in place to accommodate new inhabitants.
Health
• Tuberculosis, albeit being curable for over 60 years, continues to make a large number of fatal casualties. Unfavorable socioeconomic conditions, such as malnutrition, coupled with the appearance of strains that are resistant to the available treatments, are the main difficulties found in controlling the disease.
• A relatively large number of Brazilian cities have no doctors at all. There is no shortage of professionals, yet they prefer the advantages of the metropolises or bigger municipalities, where they feel safer to work and have faster access to the technological innovations of a field in which scientific updating is constant and necessary.
Health & beauty – Brazil ranks third in the world in the multimillionaire cosmetics industry, which generates more than R$ 20 billion annually in the country. With an eye on scientific research and technological discoveries, the esthetics field increasingly embodies techniques formerly exclusive to the sciences of health.
Music – Joaquim Callado, a master flutist who livened up parties in Rio de Janeiro with his group in the second half of the nineteenth century, is considered the creator of chorinho. Despite his premature death at the age of 32, the musician left compositions that still today are re-recorded by renowned artists.
Theater – Cacilda Becker wished, at first, to be a ballerina, yet it was as an actress that she became the star that is recalled to our days as the first lady of the Brazilian drama. On stage at the age of 48, Cacilda felt ill while playing a part of a Samuel Beckett character and died a month later.
Interview – Teresa Aguiar, a prominent theater and movie director, speaks of her professional experience and her specialty, the coaching of actors. Her curriculum includes more than 40 theatrical plays, in addition to documentaries and short films.
Thematic panel – This issue brings two talks delivered at the Fecomercio, Sesc and Senac Council of Economics, Sociology and Politics. In the first one, Fabio Medina Osório, a lawyer and a former member of the Public Prosecution, brought to focus the role of the Brazilian Public Prosecution. The highlight was the need for self-criticism and for correcting what he termed excessive fragmentation. In the second one, architect Candido Malta Campos Filho discussed solutions to big metropolises, especially São Paulo, where quality of life has been profoundly affected by the explosive growth of the last decades. The challenge is to pursue harmonious co-existence between city dwellers, lost when cars and buildings occupied the spaces in a disorderly fashion.