Brazil on Tuesday unveiled a 198.4 billion reais ($64 billion) infrastructure investment plan in a bid to stoke the country's flagging economy.
The infrastructure project, dubbed PIL 2, will see concessions on railways, roads, ports and airports, with about a third of that total -- 69.2 billion reais -- delivered by 2018.
The concessionary contracts, which include 7,000 kilometers of highways and four airports, are for construction projects, upgrade work and operating rights.
The biggest slice of the newly-unveiled investments -- 86.4 billion reais in total -- is for rail, including a much-touted Atlantic-Pacific line between Rio de Janeiro state and the Peruvian coast, for which feasibility studies were signed last month between China, Brazil and Peru.
Highways will get 66 billion reais, while ports and airports will get 37 billion and 9 billion reais respectively.
The government plans to get the concessions -- around 150 in all -- off the paper by 2018.
President Dilma Rousseff, who announced the plan alongside a number of ministers, said Brazil was "turning the page" in a "gradual, realistic" way with the new infrastructure investment plans.
"There are obstacles that initially appeared insurmountable, but a nation is united and strong when it is capable of overcoming difficulties. We're here to remind ourselves that, for us, development means investment, employment, income and quality of life. It means the capacity to grow, work and produce," Rousseff said.
The government is hoping the announcements will boost confidence among international investors and credit ratings agencies, currently unimpressed by predictions that the Brazilian economy is set to contract more than 1 percent this year.
After previous infrastructure investment plans failed to attract investors, in part due to excessive state intervention, the government is now looking to a more flexible approach on investment requirements and turnaround times to ensure enough bidders take part in the tenders.
The government will, however, also have to tackle the issue that many of the country's top construction companies are currently embroiled in Brazil's biggest-ever corruption scandal, involving state-run oil giant Petrobras, and could be banned from competing for government contracts.
Brazil's lack of good infrastructure is regularly cited as a problem to better economic growth --part of the so-called "Brazil cost" that also includes bureaucratic bottlenecks, high taxes and a dearth of skilled workers.
By Benjamin Tavener
Anadolu Agency
enerji@aa.com.tr
