Brazil’s next president will face a big, tricky in-tray
Despite the booming agribusiness sector, the country has lost its way
Hemmed in by houses on one side and the Anchieta highway to the coast on the other, the Mercedes Benz factory in São Bernardo, a suburb of São Paulo, is the company’s biggest assembly plant for trucks outside Germany. Founded in 1956, it is being modernised. As a result, it plans to almost halve its workforce of 7,400, mainly by outsourcing parts of its operations. For Mercedes, this is part of a global strategy. For São Bernardo, the heartland of Brazil’s car industry, it is a body blow.
This article appeared in the The Americas section of the print edition under the headline “Missing the samba beat”
From the October 22nd 2022 edition
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