Imports from Mexico, exports to China, goodbye to dollar orange juice

Last night, the Brazilian Ministry of Health confirmed two additional cases of swine flu in Brazil, raising the total number of cases to 10. The new cases including the second person infected in Brazilian territory, the mother of the friend of a Rio de Janeiro man who had traveled to Cancun.

As reports have noted in the last few days, China is now the top purchaser of Brazilian exports, pulling ahead of the United States in the first quarter of 2009. Lula will arrive with a delegation of government officials and business leaders to China a week from today, and according to today’s Valor Economico, both the Brazilian aeronautics giant Embraer and Brazilian producers of chicken and pork meat have pressured the government to push their interests in China. Embraer has been frustrated recently in attempts to close deals with China, and the meat exporters want to open Chinese markets to their products. The Valor article is only in their print edition, but the aptly named website Porkworld reprinted it.

Meanwhile, the dollar is tanking here in Brazil. It starts the week worth just 2.07 Brazilian reais, down from 2.22 on April 23. That’s good for some Americans, and bad for others ... like me. April 23 is not just when the dollar peaked, but also the day I rented a car for a 17-day trip. When I returned it this morning and charged it to my Amex card, it was $80 more than I would have been if I had pre-paid. (And that doesn’t include the charge for hubcaps stolen in Rio de Janeiro). Fresh off that loss, I stopped off at the cafe down the block from my apartment, where it is getting harder and harder to think of the R$2.50 glass of fresh-squeezed orange juice as “just a dollar.”

http://www.globalpost.com/notebook/brazil/090511/imports-mexico-exports-china-goodbye-dollar-orange-juice