(UEG) OBAMA TO BRAZIL: SEND US YOUR AFFLUENT, MONEY-SPENDING MASSES

If I were a restaurant owner, I might cut back a bit on Coca-Cola and stock some Guaraná. That’s the favorite soft drink in Brazil, whose tourists, propelled by the emerging giant’s roaring economy, have been spending money like, well, Americans all over the world in recent years, but especially in the U.S. Brazilians are estimated to drop almost $45 million a day while abroad; and in 2010, 1.2 million of them (the fifth largest number from any country) visited the U.S. and pumped $6 billion into the economy. And they buy more than Mickey Mouse ears: Brazilians are currently purchasing almost a tenth of the houses and apartments being sold in the Miami area. So it would make sense for the U.S., whose economy hasn’t roared in years, to roll out a redder carpet for os Brasileiros, whose applications for nonimmigrant U.S. visas have increased 234% in the past five years.

President Obama today traveled to the Mickey Mouse-ears capital, Orlando, to announce that the U.S. would finally start streamlining the tourist-visa procedure after a decade of post-9/11 strictures. The reforms are geared especially at helping visitors from Brazil and China get to the U.S. faster. Obama ordered the State Department, for example, to increase nonimmigrant visa-processing capacity in those two countries by 40% this year; ensure that 80% of tourist-visa applicants are granted interviews within 21 days; and simplify and speed up the process for “low risk” applicants such as those renewing tourist visas, and younger and older first-time Brazilian applicants.

Disponível em: http://world.time.com/2012/01/19/with-an-eye-on-the-u-s-economy-obama-will-make-it-easier-for-brazilian-chinese-tourists-to-get-visas/.

Acesso em: 16 ago. 2012. (Adaptado)

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