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 The Brazilian companies are taking up better and better positions in the list of the great international companies, and already have assets worth US$ 55 billion abroad. The information was disclosed yesterday, July 27, during the seminar International Business - Perspectives for Developing Countries, at the Brazilian advertising and marketing university ESPM, in São Paulo.
The secretary-general of the Arab Brazilian Chamber of Commerce, Michel Alaby, one of the lecturers in yesterday's panel, recalled that amongst the 100 greatest companies from developing countries, 12 are of Brazilian origin. These companies from developing countries, according to the lecturers, are considered threatening competitors to the world companies that are already internationalized. According to Paulo Salles, president for Latin America of Publicis Worldwide, a global communications company, US$ 55 billion is still a small figure if compared to the world market, but is already a start. "The Brazilian companies are starting to get their value," he remarked. In the list of internationalized enterprises from Brazil are the oil company Petrobras, mining company Vale do Rio Doce, long steel producer Gerdau, national steelworks company CSN, Duratex, in the vitreous chinaware segment, and Metalfrio, of refrigerators and commercial cooling, amongst others. Alaby showed in the seminar a list of companies that are also in the Arab market, as is the case of Randon, which has production lines in Algeria and Morocco and is studying the possibility of opening another in the United Arab Emirates, and the foodstuff company Sadia, which has an office in Dubai. According to the secretary-general at the Arab Chamber, however, there is space for more growth for Brazilian companies in that market. "In the Jebel Ali Free Zone Authority (UAE) there are two thousand foreign companies. Not one of them is Brazilian," he stated. Alaby mentioned the example of China as a country which is successfully managing to internationalize, from a policy established by the government. The aim stipulated by China in 2000, according to the secretary-general, was to have between 30 and 50 internationalized companies by 2010. Up to this year alone there are already 44 Chinese companies with operations outside the country. China is the fifth greatest international investor, present in 140 countries. In Brazil, some companies are in a similar quest. Petrobras and Vale do Rio Doce are two national companies that are investing heavily in international expansion. Petrobras has strong presence in about 20 countries, amongst them in an Arab country, Libya, where it explores and produces oil since 2005. The company employs 17,000 people abroad, according to the International Marketing and Communication manager at Petrobras, Izeusse Dias Braga Júnior, one of the lecturers at the seminar. According to Braga, the company is today the number one in exploration technology in deep waters, exactly where great part of the world's oil reserves is located. The company Vale do Rio Doce acts in 18 countries, where it employs 2,500 professionals. The company is the greatest iron ore miner in the world and started an accelerated internationalization process in the year 2000. The International Human Resources manager, Maria Gurgel, spoke at the seminar at ESPM on the investments the company makes in professionals to successfully take ahead their expansion abroad. "The challenge is to take great talents to work on projects in remote places," she says. Currently, according to Maria, of the 18 international managers the company has, only three are foreigners. The company is working, however, to prepare local professionals. "Each manager has the commitment of training a local successor," she says. Vale has a trainee programme through which they receive foreign youngsters, potential future executives from the countries in which it is present, for a specialization course. Last year nine youngsters were trained. This year there were 17 and next year there should be 35. The programme aims, according to the manager, at the sustainability of Vale's projects on the medium and long term. The seminar on international business started on Wednesday, July 26, at ESPM and finishes today (28). According to the teaching institution's communications department, this is the first meeting of the type that ESPM promotes due to the opening of the International Relations graduate course, due in 2007. Anba - www.anba.com.br
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