The Rio/São Paulo Extended Metropolitan Region: A quest for global integration

Abstract

This paper explores whether the Rio/São Paulo Extended Metropolitan Region, an area with 36 million and accounting for one-third of Brazil’s GNP, can successfully integrate into the global economy. Analysis of private investment projects in different sub-regions over the period 1995–2002 suggests that most of the investments are in high-tech or average technology rather than in low technology projects. Decentralization into the Paraiba Valley appears to be taking place rapidly. However, in the region as a whole, severe imbalances between the Rio and the São Paulo remain, and these are an obstacle to the region’s attempt to climb up the global urban hierarchy rankings.