6 ANOS DO REAL

In June, 2000, the National Congress approved Avança Brasil — the Pluri-annual Plan for the period 2000-2003, which involves expenditure of around R$ 1.1 trillion in the next four-year period, out of which R$ 585 billion will be devoted to social development and R$ 212 billion to infra-structure.

Avança Brasil tries to put in place an entrepreneurial management, a new managerial culture in public administration, based upon the successful experience of Brazil in Action, which invested around R$ 66.1 billion in the period 1995-1999. Out of this total, R$ 40.8 billion were invested in the domain of social development.

Programme Avança Brasil has identified 365 priority projects that will mobilise government in the next four years. The Programme has as its reference the survey "National Development Axes". This survey provided a kind of snapshot of the major national problems, minutely surveying the potentialities for and the stumbling blocks to development, per region and in the country as a whole.

The above mentioned study produced a portfolio of public and private investments in the areas of economic infra-structure, social development, information and knowledge, and the environment, in view of the demands of the Country, for the period 2000-2007. The amount is R$ 317 billion, to be invested in structuring and integrated projects that will have a multiplying effect and will ensue other investments.

For the management of the Plan, a manager was appointed to each project, these managers having been chosen among qualified technicians, having solid professional experience and qualities of leadership. Before they took their functions, managers go through a wide training programme. In addition, a managerial information system has also been developed, which allows managers to integrate, in real time, with the other agents involved in the programmes.

With Avança Brasil, Government adopts a strategic long-term vision for the Country’s sustainable development.

SOLIDARITY COMMUNITY

Established in 1995, Solidarity Community is a new model of social action based upon the principle of partnership. Government and society have joined forces in the struggle against poverty and exclusion in Brazil, thus increasing the participation of civil society in social initiatives. The promotion of partnerships among Government and civil-society organisations is a responsibility of the Council of Solidarity Community. The articulation of partnerships within Government itself, among the federal, state and municipality levels, is an attribution of the Executive Secretariat of Solidarity Community.

The Council of Solidarity Community, made up of 28 representatives of civil society and four of Government, acts in three different manners: it promotes political dialogue between Government and civil society in the quest for solutions for the main items in the social agenda; it supports non-profit organisations, the so-called third sector.

The three innovating programmes of Solidarity Community are aimed at improving the relationship between Government and society via more participatory and decentralised actions.

The Solidarity University is a programme that counts on the participation of university students and professors in community work in some of the poorest municipalities in the Country. The teams transmit information and basic health, education, community organisation and citizenship notions, involving, particularly, the local multiplying agents — teachers and their students, health agents and community leaderships. The programme has mobilised, along its five years of operation, the work of 8.600 university students, 850 professors and 160 universities in around 800 Brazilian municipalities.

Solidarity Literacy Programme was established in order to reduce the rates of illiteracy in the country among young people from 12 to 18 years of age, without, however, rejecting adults. Based upon the censuses carried out by the Brazilian Institute for Geography and Statistics (IBGE), municipalities having the highest number of illiterate people are chosen. Now, the Programme completes service delivery to 1.1 million Brazilians in 1.005 municipalities in 15 states and in the metropolitan areas of São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro and the Federal District.

Solidarity Training and Development Programme is aimed at professionally training and fitting into the labour market young people between the ages of 14 and 21, coming from low-income families of metropolitan areas. The courses, offered by organisations of the civil community and funded by private initiative, are selected by means of a public competition. The criterion for selection is the innovating character of projects proposed. The Programme also provides training and development to Non-Governmental Organisations involved, by means of the course "social managers", thus strengthening the communities where it operates. From 1996 to 1999, there were partnerships with 978 NGOs and 51 thousand young people were trained.

Starting in 1999, a step forward was taken in terms of social policy, already developed by Solidarity Community. the Active Community Programme was launched, the new way the Federal Government found to induce Sustainable and Local Integrated Development in Brazil (DELIS). Putting in place Active Community started in 150 municipalities with the lowest Human Development Indexes (IDHs) and with less than 50.000 inhabitants. Within Active Community, it befalls municipalities themselves to identify their callings and needs, and to decide on priority actions that should make up the local development agenda. One of the novelties of Active Community is the training of local leaderships, so that they can manage their own development process.