Brazil's balance of trade recorded a surplus (exports minus imports) of US$ 305 million from July 1st to 4th. Foreign sales totaled US$ 3.187 billion and purchases from other countries by Brazil totaled US$ 2.882 billion.
In the accumulated result for the year, the result went up to US$ 11.655 billion, with an average daily exports of US$ 738.8 million and imports of US$ 647.1 million.
During the period, imports have continued to increase at a much higher rate (51.5%) than exports (24.4%) in the average per business day.
Rural Credit
The Bank of Brazil is going to make available 30.8 billion Brazilian reais (US$ 19.1 billion) for the financing of rural credit in the 2008/2009 crop.
The value corresponds to an increase of 25% over that made available in the previous crop, when funds totaled 24.7 billion (US$ 15.3 billion).
Of the value announced July 7, 7.8 billion reais (US$ 4.8 billion) are going to benefit family farming and the remains is going to supply other producers and their cooperatives.
According to the Agribusiness vice president at the Bank of Brazil, Luiz Carlos Guedes Pinto, the funds are already being made available for farmers. "Producers may go to banks to start the process for credit," he informed.
ABr
