'Brazil needs no drastic steps to tackle global financial crisis'

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RIO DE JANEIRO, Oct 14 (Xinhua): Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said yesterday that he didn't believe the international financial crisis would affect Brazil so much that drastic measures are needed.
In Toledo, Spain, where he received the Don Quixote Award from Spanish King Juan Carlos, Lula shrugged off speculations about Brazil's economy amid the current global financial crisis.
"The crisis was born in richer countries, and the most tranquil ones at this moment are emerging countries," he said. He reaffirmed that the Brazilian government's social programmes and infrastructure projects would not suffer budget cuts or be suspended.
"Brazil will keep on exporting, our economy will keep growing. The crisis may reach any country in the world, it is true, but if it reaches Brazil, we will work with a lot of care so that it does not cause too much trouble," Lula said.
The president defended the measures taken by European governments to aid ailing banks, and said that the Brazilian Central Bank is fully prepared for an emergency situation. He also asked the Brazilian public not to worry about future food price hike.
On his weekly show "Breakfast with the President" broadcast on the same day, Lula reassured that the projects of the federal government's growth acceleration project (PAC) would continue, as well as the investments to the state-owned oil and gas giant Petrobras.