Agência Brasil*
Rio de Janeiro – The Brazilian Development Bank (BNDES), government owned bank for development projects, plans on making available US$ 22.6 billion to finance projects this year. According to the planning director at the institution, Antonio Barros de Castro, the value is in line with the demand.
According to him, the framed finance requests (projects that have all the requisites for the liberation of resources, but have not yet been approved), requests being analysed, approved and singed requests, already cover 70% of the total, which represents a firm demand. The remaining 30% are for projects being consulted.
This aim corresponds to an increase in 50% in nominal terms in relation to 2004, said Castro. Such demand has as highlights the great projects returning to the bank, some of which with values above US$ 1 billion. Many of them are in the infrastructure area, not only in Brazil, but also in other countries, as long as they have a good participation share of Brazilian companies.
Castro stated that the BNDES currently has a portfolio of US$ 46 billion, net assets of US$ 5.3 billion and reference assets of approximately US$ 7.9 billion. The payments made by the institution between 2000 and 2003 have remained constant, rising about 7% in 2004, when about US$ 15 billion were released.
Small ones
The BNDES is also interested this year in giving attention to innovative projects that bring risks that cannot be analysed in the standard manner, as well as reasserting their support to the micro, small and medium sized companies, through financial agents (private banks, for example), or through the so called Local Productive Arrangements (APLs).
The participation of the micro and small companies segment in the total granted by the BNDES went from 19% in 2000 to 32% in 2004, highlighted Castro. The bank will prioritise this year, as they have been doing, their support to the internationalisation of the Brazilian companies, through exports of products and services.
*With information of the ANBA Newsroom. Translated by Silvia Lindsey.
