Easier access to working visas

Brazilian authorities are considering to ease regulations in order to facilitate the access of highly qualified foreign professionals to Brazil. The NBCC is following the process with great interest, and asking members for input.

According to the newspaper O Globo, a working group in the SAE, the president’s Secretariat of Strategic Affairs (Secretaria de Assuntos Estratégicos da Presidência da República), is elaborating new immigration regulations in order to facilitate the access to working visas to foreign and highly skilled professionals interested in working in Brazil.

Brazil is looking to attract more Norwegian investments, and the embassy in Oslo is processing an increasing number of visa applications.

To Norwegian professionals the bureaucracy in obtaining work permits is considered demanding and slow. Unpredictable immigration practices when arriving in Brazil is also something being discussed frequently by the chambers and their members, and visa regulations was one of the topics discussed at the first joint meeting between the board members of the NBCC and the BNCC in November last year.

Members are now being invited to share suggestions and comments.

- I have had a conversation with the project coordinator in charge of the work group on visa regimes for qualified professionals. He welcomed my comments from the Norwegian business community in Brazil, and invited me to send our comments in written form, as a contribution to the work group, which I will certainly do. I am open to your contributions, in order to stress the main points on the subject matter, in Brazil-Norway bilateral terms, says Mr. Paulo Guimarães, minister counselor at the Brazilian embassy in Oslo and also embassy representative in the Brazilian-Norwegian Chamber of Commerce in Norway.

VIP treatment
According to O Globo, the Brazilian Ministry of Labour conceded 51.353 working visas to foreigners from January to September last year, an increase of 32 percent from the year before.

Economist Ricardo Paes de Barros is coordinating the SAE advisory group, and he would like to give qualified workers VIP treatment in the visa process. The current regulations defining who is allowed to work in Brazil date back to 1980, and everyone applying for a working visa in Brazil today has to get in the same line, even though many has qualifications urgently needed in Brazil.

According to O Globo, SAE is now studying if regulations are too strict, making the process extremely time-consuming, and the work group is proposing a more selective process, depending on the applicant and his or her qualifications, making it possible for highly qualified foreigners to skip the line and obtaining the visa sooner.

Brain drain
To the head minister of SAE, Moreira Franco, conceding visas is to be seen as a transfer of technology and a way to obtain valuable knowledge. Brazilian authorities would like to transform Brazil into a n attractive market for skilled European professionals currently unemployed as a result of the financial crisis – a brain drain , as Mr Franco calls it.
A preliminary proposal on how to improve the visa process for skilled foreign workers should be ready in March. Both economists, lawyers, sociologists and demographers are taking part in the process.

Brazilian authorities are using Canadian and Australian regulations on immigration as a model when elaborating a more selective immigration process.

Those interested in sharing suggestions or comments, please contact Mr. Paulo Guimarães at pg@brasil.no

By Runa Hestmann Tierno, NBCC journalist