英语论文网

.

In spite of the strong power of institutions, the ineffective political system is considered as a risk and political reforms are required for party loyalty, transparency and effectiveness improvements (The Economist Intelligence, 2008). As the party system in Brazil is highly fragmented with more than 19 parties, the interconnection between state governments, legislative and executive bodies is difficult and therefore implementation for policies is often slow and complicated (Blaauw, 2009).

Social inequality

On the other hand, the social condition in Brazil is described as high inequality, numerous challenges in the form of educational, racial and ethnic divisions, income distribution and social security reforms have yet to be addressed. There are a deep division between the blacks and whites. Compared to the whites, blacks are lack of quality education, healthcare, political representation and income distribution is extremely uneven (The PRS Group, 2008). The lowest 10% of income earners only taking 0.8% of total income, however, the highest 10% earn nearly 46%. As a result, Brazil has a high GINI-coefficient at 58.0 with about 20% of Brazilian are living in poverty. (Blaauw, 2009).

Poor infrastructure

In addition, infrastructure in Brazil such as ports, roads, and rail remains much to be desired. The Brazilian have the concept of time and try to be punctual, therefore the inefficiently run seaports can be a main serious impediments to trade (The PRS Group, 2008). However, most of products are imported by sea, with the high offloading cost, complex paperwork at ports and long turnaround time, it is considered as a risk (ibid). Notwithstanding there are none significant improvement yet by the Port reform legislation, government will take effective steps to enhance port facilities (ibid). For instance, partially privatize The Rio and Espírito Santo ports which can shorten turnaround time and lower costs (ibid). Secondly, with the lack of extensive rail network, inner state transportation is mainly transported by truck through the poor highway network system (The PRS Group, 2008). The high fuel costs add to the transportation cost significantly (ibid). However, river transport improvements have been limited regarding to the environment concerns and geographic constraints (ibid).

Increased demand for frozen food

It is considered that the vast multitudes of Brazilian spend a third of incomes on food, and are increasingly receptive to microwave meals, is an encouraging point for retailers. It is believed that nowadays are more receptive to the acquisition of kitchen appliances such as microwaves (Newswire Today, 2006).

Another corollary trend for the supermarket industry is the increasing demand for frozen food in a typical Brazilian meal due to high level of disposable income and busy life. Newswire Today (2006) reports the fast growing frozen food has created a leap of nearly 300% on the sales of frozen vegetables in the past three years as Brazilian per capita income is rising with the recovering economy. This favorable turn will lead to better living standards as consumers begin to dispense of their higher personal incomes (ibid).

Wander (2006) agrees with this observation. He states that the food industry is one of the chief driving forces of Brazil’s