São Paulo – The diplomat José Mauro Couto will take office at the Brazilian embassy in Khartoum next September. Couto, a 55-year-old Rio de Janeiro native, hails from the Brazilian Ministry of National Integration and is having his first appointment as ambassador. His plans are many. He is keen on fuelling agricultural cooperation, so more Brazilian businessmen can farm and develop projects in the African country, perhaps with Arab funding. He would also like to see small-scale farmers in Sudan buy equipment from Brazil and rely on Brazilian credit and training. He will work to foster closer ties between the two countries’ sugar and ethanol industries.
Couto’s plans also include providing technical training to youths and women in Sudan, increasing their chance of finding work, encouraging entrepreneurship and helping local museums highlight their collections. The diplomat is set to arrive in the Arab country on September 17th, alongside his family. His son and daughter will perform voluntary work, he says.
This Monday (25th) and Tuesday (26th), Couto will convene with executives from Brazilian companies and organizations at the Arab Brazilian Chamber of Commerce offices in São Paulo. They will discuss potential actions to be developed in the Arab country.
Read below the main stretches of Couto’s interview to ANBA:
ANBA – How has your diplomatic career been so far?
José Mauro Couto – I have been stationed at many posts. I have served at the Foreign Ministry for 35 years now, and this will be my first time heading an embassy. My career, in Brazil and abroad, has always revolved around commercial negotiation and promotion – at embassies, the Foreign Ministry, and the Brazilian Ministry of Development, Industry and Foreign Trade. This is why I am here today, enjoying this opportunity to develop activities with the Arab Chamber’s backing and bring Sudan and Brazil closer together.
Was it your choice to work primarily with economics?
Circumstance led me to specialize in this field. I graduated in Law and shortly thereafter I took a master’s course in International Relations at Boston University. But when I arrived at the Brazilian embassy in Germany with all my baggage in law and political science, there were no openings available for this line of work, so the ambassador deployed me to commercial promotion. The embassy was located in Bonn, but the commercial promotion department was in Cologne. The city has always been a special place when it comes to promoting trade, because German cities are posts along trade routes for textiles and higher value-added goods; spices and salt have been brought in from the South since the Middle Age. Cologne hosts a major food industry fair, Anuga, as well as furniture fairs and a bevy of other products. That was where I discovered my knack for public speaking, for interpersonal contact and for a somewhat more concrete dimension of our diplomacy, namely commercial diplomacy.
Where are you coming from now?
I served at the Brazilian Ministry of Development, Industry and Foreign Trade for eight years and then went to work at the Ministry of National Integration, mostly focusing on cooperation for irrigation techniques. The Ministry of National Integration was established by Celso Furtado in a bid to raise per capita income in Northeast, North and Midwest Brazil closer to the national average, which is 60% higher. We travelled abroad often to learn. We also received frequent delegations from Latin America, Africa and the Near East, for instance, seeking out information about the São Francisco River diversion, which the ministry is in charge of.
And how did the opportunity come up to be ambassador in Sudan?
I was offered it. I had planned to return to the Foreign Ministry to be head of department. While I waited an opportunity, I got offered the position in Sudan. I already knew the country and readily accepted it. In actuality, the challenge of assuming the post in Sudan is, to a large extent, dependent upon good commercial promotion work. I am going to reap the fruits of extremely well-performed work by my predecessors. The embassy is relatively new, was only inaugurated in 2006, and my predecessors have worked hard to advertise the Brazilian government’s political commitment to sponsoring social welfare and political growth in Sudan.
We have a historical social debt towards Africa and an anthropological, social task to perform between Brazil and Africa. In the latest census conducted by the IBGE (Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics), 53% of Brazil’s population declared to be of African ascent. Whenever Brazilians set out looking for Africa, they are often seeking their unknown roots. Upon arriving in Sudan, for instance, they find that the country indeed does need support; it needs help attaining the level of development Brazil has achieved, and yet its history harks back 8,000 years and its civilization is palpable in the ruins of several Unesco World Heritage Cities (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) along the Nile Valley. Those cities had their own writing, apart from the hieroglyphs they inherited from the Lower Nile, now called the Nile Delta. Their writing is yet to be fully decoded and its symbols were the elephant and the lion. It is fascinating. For people who travel to Sudan and find that maybe that is where they came from, the country is a pleasant surprise. It’s easy to say ‘I am of African ascent,’ but isn’t it even more interesting to find out exactly where your ancestors were from, to research your DNA and learn in what country your roots lie? Europeans know it; they say ‘I am of Italian ascent, of German ascent,’ but this is harder to do in Africa, because of how Africans came to our continent. Brazilians return from Sudan extremely proud of the perspectives and the future of Sudan.
Why are the perspectives good?
Sudan experienced a very violent division from South Sudan in 2011, following a referendum. South Sudan became independent in July 2011 and is still having difficulties achieving political stability, but it will come eventually. And Sudan plans on being a food supplier to the Arab world and Africa. It has the territory. Although it has lost 30% of its land upon separating from the South, it remains the third largest country in Africa and it has water from its three Niles, the Blue Nile, the White Nile and the Nile. The Nile gets 80% of its waters from the Blue River, which belongs exclusively to Ethiopia and Sudan. As a result, there is a Mesopotamian area between the White and Blue rivers which is extremely fertile ground, and these waters entail a vast potential for irrigation. The country’s topology is flat and Brazilian farmers are developing projects there with great success. Thus, I believe I can work to enhance mutual knowledge between Brazil and Sudan, to bring out the potentialities on both ends, and above all to incite businessmen and government officials to travel to Sudan, to get to know the country better and realize the opportunities it holds. Of coursem the Arab countries – especially those with the most funds available, like Qatar, the Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait – have already discovered Sudan. They are already funding various projects, and could even fund projects involving Brazilian organizations and enterprises, as could other international financial institutions.
Apart from that, of course, there are specific niches. I envision good opportunities in livestock farming, because Sudan’s herd is quite interesting and they want to make production more vertical. In other words, they need to improve herd quality, because they already have the quantity. They have the land to explore and would like for Brazilian meat companies to cooperate with tme, set up operations there and help develop their industry. And then you have the beef, poultry, cereal and sugarcane industries. After my short stay in the São Paulo state capital, I am heading to the country to attend a fair, Fenasucro, alongside a Sudanese delegation that will tour the state’s countryside looking to purchase sugar and ethanol industry equipment. Brazil’s sugar and ethanol manufacturing company Dedini already has a plant operating in Sudan, shipping ethanol to Sweden. And they are coming to Brazil to maybe purchase equipment for and industry that is poised to become the most eventful in our short-term relations: the sugar and ethanol capital goods industry.
Is having Brazilians travel to Sudan to work on production the best format when it comes to providing assistance?
We do not rule out any format when it comes to fostering development in Sudan. We will employ a multifaceted approach to sponsoring Sudan’s development and increasing cooperation between our countries. On the one hand you have the large-scale agricultural industry, like our sugar and ethanol industry. A case in point is Gilson Preço, chairman of Abraça (the Brazilian Cotton Growers Association), who farms cotton, soy, beans sorghum and rice in Sudan. Then, on the other hand, you have small-scale farming. The Brazilian Ministry of Agrarian Development already has a program underway, called Mais Alimentos (More Food), and it provides for the exporting of equipment and the provision of training to family farmers in Africa. The program is already operational in Kenya and Tanzania, and I would really like for Sudan to be next. We export the equipment and provide the financing and training so farmers can make good use of equipment, such as tractors.
Apart from agriculture, what is your expectation regarding Sudan?
There is a lot of work to be done. Naturally, some of it entails providing support to Sudanese institutions for the elections due in April. Recently, a delegation of electoral authorities in charge of organizing the process travelled to Brazil. They were greatly interested and proud to find that Brazil, a developing country, boasts such a highly developed electoral process. This goes to show they trust our institutions and believe we can also help them in this respect.
We are also keen on working with them on different aspects of the social field. By this I mean empowing young people and women. Youths who have no opportunities often migrate from the country to the cities, causing social imbalances. The women are still plagued by prejudice to an extent – a situation typical of some Muslim countries –, and they have less of a chance of moving forward in their careers than men. We want to work on this and design social programmes using techniques employed in Brazil to foster entrepreneurship, via the Sebrae (Micro and Small Business Support Company), agricultural research, via the Embrapa (Brazilian Agricultural Research Corporation), establish technical schools, again for entrepreneurship, via the Senai (Social Service for Industry), and implement the More Food programme.
I plan on visiting the Quinta da Boa Vista Museum in Rio de Janeiro – …maybe it’s a local thing… (laughter) – and work on cooperation with the Khartoum Museum to highlight the museum’s artwork a bit more, because I think it deserves more attention. Brazil is gaining expertise in curating, showcasing and highlighting art pieces.
You seem to know a lot about Sudan. Have you been there already?
I was lucky to be able to work with the Arab Chamber during my years at the Ministry of Development, Industry and Foreign Trade, and I was in touch with the Chamber a lot during [former Chamber president Salim] Schahin’s term in office. If I am not mistaken, we took three trips on the Brazilian Air Force’s 707 aircraft, and we took a hundred businessmen on each of these trips. The last of these trips was also the longest and most laborious; we went to Syria, Iran, Qatar, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. And as if it was not enough, I was invited by my boss, Miguel Jorge [then minister of Development, Industry and Foreign Trade] to extend my stay in Sudan. Alongside a dozen business executives, I travelled to Sudan in late 2010. I have stayed in touch with the ambassador since, gathering information about the country, and when I was offered the opportunity to represent Brazil in Sudan, I promptly accepted.
How about the political issue?
The political issue has been settled; we have prevented the United States from having the United Nations enforce its sanctions on Sudan, which are not helping the country’s development. Another political aspect of our relations is the fact that last May, we relieved 90% of Sudan’s debt to Brazil. Sudan had an outstanding debt of US$ 40 million and Brazil relieved US$ 36 million. It is a palpable token of our appreciation of Sudan’s stance, and proof that we are eager to befriend Sudan on its journey towards promoting the welfare of its people.
Are you travelling alone to Sudan?
I am travelling with my family, my wife, my son and my daughter.
And how do they feel about it?
They think it’s great. My wife is a veterinarian; my children have completed their studies and are planning on spending a year performing voluntary work. They will spend a year with me doing voluntary work and experiencing a different reality.
*Translated by Gabriel Pomerancblum
