Industrial Policy & Trade Monitor· 2667 actions· ✨ 89 recent

Brazil's federal innovation-financing agency FINEP (Financiadora de Estudos e Projetos), under the MCTI/FNDCT umbrella, published a BRL 300 million (~USD 56.9 million) public call — "Finep Mais Inovação Brasil – Rodada 2 – Cadeias Agroindustriais Sustentáveis" — offering non-repayable economic-subsidy grants for private-sector research, development and innovation projects in sustainable and digital agro-industrial chains, covering food innovation, food and nutritional security, agricultural productivity, and technical textiles. Applicant companies must be Brazilian and may partner with Scientific, Technological and Innovation Institutions (ICTs). Proposals are accepted on a continuous-flow basis until 2026-09-30 18:00 (Brasília time), or earlier if the budget is exhausted.

Brazil's national development bank BNDES approved BRL 950 million (~USD 176 million) in financing on 12 January 2026 for Inpasa Agroindustrial S/A to build its sixth Brazilian biorefinery, in Luís Eduardo Magalhães, western Bahia. The package blends BRL 350 million from Fundo Clima (concessional climate fund) with BRL 600 million from the BNDES Finem line, which Global Trade Alert flags for local-content incentives. The plant will process up to 1 million tonnes of corn, sorghum and other grains a year, producing an estimated 498 million litres of ethanol, 248,900 tonnes of DDGS and 185 GWh of electricity, reaching full capacity from 2027.

On 29 December 2025, Brazil's national development bank BNDES approved R$1.13 billion (~USD 205 million) in financing for Companhia Siderúrgica Nacional (CSN) to modernise three industrial plants at the Usina Presidente Vargas in Volta Redonda (RJ). R$625.8 million comes through the Finem credit line for sintering-plant emissions-control upgrades (new electrostatic precipitators and bag filters) that partly reimburse investments CSN made since 2023 to satisfy a Term of Adjustment of Conduct (TAC) with Rio de Janeiro's state environmental agency (INEA). A further R$500 million comes through the BNDES Mais Inovação programme for innovative machinery, IT equipment and IoT technology services. BNDES states the financing "fortalece a cadeia produtiva nacional de equipamentos" (strengthens the national equipment supply chain), giving the operation a domestic-content-preference dimension alongside its environmental/innovation financing purpose.

Brazil's national development bank BNDES approved a BRL 384.3 million (~USD 70.2 million) loan under its "BNDES Mais Inovação" innovation credit line to FS Indústria de Biocombustíveis Ltda. (FS Bioenergia), financing the country's first Bioenergy with Carbon Capture and Storage (BECCS) unit at its corn-ethanol plant in Lucas do Rio Verde, Mato Grosso. The facility will compress, inject, and permanently store CO2 in the saline sedimentary reservoirs of the Parecis Basin, targeting removal of ~423,000 tonnes of CO2 per year — effectively eliminating the plant's process emissions. The loan is state-directed concessional financing for a single named domestic producer and forms part of BNDES's broader decarbonisation and carbon-market financing push aligned with the Lula government's energy-transition agenda.

Brazil's national development bank BNDES approved BRL 300 million (~USD 55.7 million) in financing on 27 October 2025 for Neomille S.A. (CerradinhoBio group) to expand its corn-processing plant in Chapadão do Céu, Goiás. The package draws on two lines — BRL 240 million from Fundo Clima (climate fund, below-market rate) and BRL 60 million from BNDES Finem Incentivada — and will lift the plant's corn-ethanol capacity to up to 527,000 m3 per harvest, DDGS output to 265,000 tonnes, and corn-oil output to 21,000 tonnes, while creating 91 permanent jobs. Global Trade Alert classifies the BNDES Finem Incentivada leg as a "certainly harmful" local-content-incentive intervention.

Brazil's national development bank BNDES approved BRL 400 million in financing (BRL 320m from the Fundo Clima climate fund plus BRL 80m via the Finem line) for Lwart Soluções Ambientais SA to expand its used/contaminated lubricating-oil (Oluc) re-refining plant in Lençóis Paulista, São Paulo. The BRL 713 million total project will raise annual Oluc processing capacity by 144,000 m³, making the plant the world's second-largest by processing capacity and displacing demand for virgin base oil imports.

Brazil's national development bank BNDES approved R$625 million in financing on 11 August 2025 for São Martinho S/A to build a second processing line at its Boa Vista corn-ethanol complex in Quirinópolis, Goiás, blending R$500 million from the concessional Fundo Clima with R$125 million from the standard BNDES Finem line. FINEP (Financiadora de Estudos e Projetos) is contributing a further R$102.8 million earmarked for the project's innovative components — Industry 4.0 process technology and a first-in-Brazil vinasse oil-recovery process. Combined, the two public financiers cover R$727.8 million (~62%) of the R$1.18 billion total project cost, with São Martinho funding the remaining R$452.2 million from its own resources. The expansion adds 635,000 tonnes/year of corn-milling capacity and 270,000 m³/year of ethanol output, targeted for 2027 start-up.

Brazil's national development bank BNDES approved BRL 133.2 million (approx. USD 23.5 million) in financing to Coopavel Cooperativa Agroindustrial, a Paraná-based agricultural cooperative, toward a BRL 144.3 million total investment. The operation was structured under the Plano Safra framework using resources from the Programa para Construção e Ampliação de Armazéns (PCA) and Prodecoop. Funds expand and modernize grain-receiving and input-sale units in Três Barras and Céu Azul (Paraná), lifting combined storage capacity by roughly 19,600 tonnes and raising annual feed-ration output from 630,000 to 690,000 tonnes.