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Centre of Development Studies

 

Please note, this Seminar is cancelled

Manufacturing Brazil: BNDES and the political economy of national development banking

This talk will examine the role of BNDES, the world's third largest national development bank (NDB), in the process of industrialisation, structural transformation and rise of several national champion firms in diverse sectors such as agri-business, aerospace, oil and gas, among others in Brazil. Despite these success stories, BNDES, unlike national development banking in  some successful East Asian economies and Germany, has not been able to 'crowd-in' high-levels of private investment outside the 'national champion' story. In fact, while the country achieved some of the fastest rates of growth and structural transformation in the period 1940-1980, the post-1990 period has seen relatively low levels of investment and savings poor manufacturing performance and substantial de-industrialisation. The second part of the presentation will discuss the political economy behind this  'great industrial divide' and the implications it has for policy debates in Brazil and beyond. 

 

Date: 
Thursday, 20 February, 2020 - 15:30 to 17:00