Demand for electronics will grow back only in 2018, says Abinee

Sao Paulo-the electronics industry can resume the growth only in 2018, after three years of poor performance. The high sales should appear first in consumer goods and then in infrastructure equipment.
"The year of 2016 is being of great difficulty and the prospect so far is to keep at least the size of the industry, but there''s a lot of idleness", said the President of the Brazilian Association of electrical and Electronics Industry (Abinee), Humberto Barbato. To him, the sector must still face problems with the lower demand for electronics in the country in 2017.
The survey made by the retraction of 8% indicates revenue this year. For 2017, the estimate is 1% high in the amount billed. "There is a strong trend toward stability in 2017 in the areas that we are following," said the Manager of the Economics Department of the Association, Luiz Cezar Rochel.
He highlighted the performance of exports in the category of computers, whose shipment of printers is increasing. "We don''t know which company is bringing those numbers, but the high leads us to believe that was mounted a export base. Because in recent years the sending of printers to Mexico, United States, Panama and Argentina grew, "commented Rochel. Despite the high turnover in computer science has an estimated 23% recoil R$ 23.35 billion this year.
The exports of the sector as a whole dropped 5% this year, to $5.59 billion, and imports totaled US $25.30 billion, down 20% compared with last year. Rochel pointed out that the smaller volume of imports must reduce in 23% the sector''s trade balance deficit, reaching US $19.71 billion.
"The improvement in the balance didn''t come high exports. And we did a survey of the behavior of the exchange rate this year and noticed that the dollar quoted below 3.40 R$, the industry''s exports fall, "he said.
In the evaluation of Rochel, the Brazilian products abroad become competitive in landing the Exchange R$ 3.80, the current scenario. After starting the year at 4.05 R$ the dollar came in October at the level of R$ 3.19, according to Abinee. Without expectation of expanding exports, the recovery of the sector depends on the internal market.
"It''s been going on a postponement of purchases. Because if in 2014 Brazil via the unemployed neighbor, in 2016 he''d had one or more people at his house without employment and it is unclear how long we will live this stagnation. Then the goods of basic necessity are placed in front, "noted Barbato.
Products such as coffeemaker, hairdryer and Fryer without oil, which this year have registered better performance compared to other categories, should not have both featured in 2017, the consultancy Euromonitor. "These categories should still have good performance, but the others should also improve, reducing the difference that we see this year," explained an analyst at Euromonitor, Elton Morimitsu. He expects the scenario for this industry to continue challenging in 2017, relevant only in 2018.
Infrastructure
Already the category of equipment for generation, transmission and distribution (GTD) of energy, dependent on the advancement of infrastructure investments in Brazil, accompanies the remaining areas and must have stable performance or slight fall in 2017. According to Abinee, the billing category should fall 1% next year, after a 3 percent advance for R$ 16.59 billion in 2016.
"The area of electrical infrastructure is old and demands living happily auctions are still going on. In 2018, we can take off in that area if we''re competitive and that''s our concern, "Barbato.
The Director of GTD in Abinee, William Marin, recalled that contributions in the electricity sector are long-term and, as the time for construction of projects is increasing, it is expected that the demand for equipment take more time to achieve. "We can see in up to three years of requests," he cited.