The assembly line at Marcopolo, a bus bodywork manufacturer in Brazil's far south, resembles the opening ceremony at the Olympics. Like flag-bearing delegations, mini-buses and vans in varied colours and designs inch forward as they head to compete with their international counterparts in markets from South Africa to Cuba.

More than 3,000km to the north-east, on the outskirts of Salvador, the living room-turned-office of a women's co-operative is crammed to the ceiling with boxes of beachwear heading for Australia and France. Further north in the Amazon region, miners work round the clock in giant open-cast pits as CVRD, the world's biggest iron ore company, struggles to keep pace with the demands of Chinese steel mills.