Just The Facts: Brazil’s Global Economic Clout

1. As of 2013, Brazil’s GDP was just over $3 trillion, making it the seventh-largest in the world.

2. Brazil’s economy surpassed eighth-ranked France’s ($2.53 trillion, in 2013) for the first time in 2007.

3. In 2007, the gap between the Brazilian and French economies was about $20 billion.

4. The gap has widened every year since and is now almost half a trillion dollars.

5. The only countries with larger economies than Brazil are the United States ($16.8 trillion), China ($16.1 trillion), India ($6.8 trillion), Japan ($4.7 trillion), Germany ($3.5 trillion) and Russia ($3.5 trillion).

6. Brazil has two key economic advantages over France (and, for that matter, most other countries) — land and people.

7. Encompassing the resource-rich Amazon river system and rain forest, Brazil covers 8.5 million sq. kms and is more than 15 times the size of France.

8. Brazil’s population of 200 million is nearly three times larger than France’s (66 million).

9. Brazil won its independence from Portugal in 1820 and was, at the time, Portugal’s largest overseas colony.

Upshot: Today, Brazil’s economy is more than ten times the size of Portugal’s economy, its former colonizer.

Note on data: All GDP figures are expressed in terms of purchasing power parity, which takes into account the differences in the prices of goods and services between countries. All data are available in the IMF’s World Economic Outlook database (October 2014 edition).