Swedish Businessman Takes a Swing at Alibaba and eBay - Launches 39 Language Online Marketplace

The economic crisis and political turmoil in Brazil are negatively impacting the country’s chemical industry, according to industry association Abiquim. Demand for chemical products in Brazil fell 7.9% in the last 12 months – the largest decline in 25 years. Abiquim describes the industry as operating at the lowest level of production in its history.

However, the organisation emphasised that Brazil’s chemical industry has enormous growth potential, pointing to a favourable supply of raw materials, and citing the country’s thriving agriculture sector, as well as the biodiversity of its forests.

The reverberations of Brazil’s economic difficulties have also been felt in the government’s funding of science. For example, thecountry’s Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation has seen its budget shrink by one-third from 2014 to 2016.

Rebecca Trager