Rio, 9/11/2003 (Agência Brasil - ABr) - The president of the Brazilian Association of Foreign Trade (AEB), Benedicto Moreira, says that the country's trade surplus this year will make it possible to balance its foreign accounts.

But Moreira adds that the situation is different for next year. He points out that with 80% of Brazilian exports concentrated in commodities of low aggregate value (such as soybeans and iron ore), export revenue depends heavily on international prices. Another problem, according to Moreira, is that part of this year's surplus was due to a drop in imports that began back in 2002. He says that with economic growth it is natural for imports to rise and if that rise coincides with a drop in international commodity prices, Brazil's trade surplus will fall and it may become difficult to balance accounts in 2004. Moreira says the solution is a strong export effort, which does not exist in Brazil, and which could include services in the engineering area.

Moreira explains that Brazil imports services worth US$14 billion, and exports only US$9 billion. He says that by eliminating that US$5 billion deficit the gain will be enormous.He called for the Brazilian Development Bank (BNDES) to be more flexible about financing exports of services. (AB)