Doença holandesa, indústria de petróleo e a economia brasileira: alguns apontamentos.

Abstract

Brazil began a process of industrial stagnation at the end of the 20th century, which can be associated with a shift in the focus of economic policies. From the 1980s onwards, there was a transition from goals aimed at achieving economic development to goals of inflation control and economic liberalization, prematurely exposing the national industry to international competition. Furthermore, the beginning of the 21st century was marked by the commodities boom, especially in the oil and gas sector in Brazil, which may have contributed to slowing industrial growth. Part of this process may be associated with the contraction of Dutch Disease, which, briefly, can be defined as deindustrialization caused by the increase in exports of primary products and subsequent currency overvaluation. In this sense, the purpose of this study is to analyze the performance of the Brazilian industrial sector from 2000 to 2023, in an economic scenario where the country achieves self-sufficiency in oil, intensifies its exploration in the sector, with advances in the Pre-Salt, and exponentially increases its exports. The general objective of this monograph is to analyze the possible repercussions of the increase in oil and gas exports in recent decades on the Brazilian industrial sector, assuming that Brazil has already begun its deindustrialization process previously. The secondary objective is to investigate whether Brazil suffers from Dutch Disease, through the analysis of the manifestation, or not, of the classic symptoms of the disease in the Brazilian economy. Additionally, it seeks to explore alternatives to mitigate the negative impacts on the national industry caused by the increase in oil exports, so that the development of this sector brings benefits to the country that outweigh the harms. After empirical analysis, it is possible to conclude that Brazil does not present Dutch Disease, but it is facing stagnation in the industrial sector, and this process may be related to the reprimarization of its productive structure. In recent decades, there has been accelerated growth in the oil sector, and Petrobras' current divestment policy contributes to the reprimarization of the Brazilian economy, as the company's focus is centered on the extraction and production of crude oil, with lower added value, thus keeping Brazil in international trade under the condition of a commodity-exporting and industrialized-product-importing country.