Crazy Facts About Brazil


Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At 8.5 million square kilometers and with over 211 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area and the sixth most populous.

  • Brazil is the 5th largest country in the world and it's home to 210 million people as of 2019.
  • Brazil is defined as a "federal republic" composed of the Federal District, 26 states, and 5,570 municipalities.
  • Brazil was once called "United States of Brazil."
  • Brazil occupies 47.3% of South America and borders all other countries except Ecuador and Chile.
  • Brazil's economy is the world's 8th-largest by GDP as of 2019.
  • Brazil has the 2nd highest number of airports in the world, after the U.S.
  • Voting is mandatory in Brazil.
  • Brazil has been the largest producer of coffee for the last 150 years.
  • The Macaw is the national animal of Brazil.
  • 92% of all new sold cars in Brazil use ethanol as fuel, which is produced from sugar cane.
  • Brazil was the world's first country to ban tanning beds.
  • In Brazil, just 43% of adults have a high-school degree. In Sweden, it's 87%.
  • Apple's iPhone is almost twice more expensive in Brazil than in the U.S.
  • Brazil's Capital, Brasilia, looks like an aeroplane from above.
  • Brazil's capital, Brasilia, took just 41 months to build, from 1956 to 1960.
  • Rio de Janeiro was once the capital of Portugal, making it the only European capital outside of Europe.
  • The biggest Japanese community outside of Japan is in Brazil.
  • Rio de Janeiro means "January River" and it was called that by mistake. A Portuguese explorer thought the bay was the mouth of a river.
  • The 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, will be the first time a South American country has the right to host them.
  • The Amazon rainforest encompasses an area of 5,500,000 sq kilometres (2,100,000 sq mi), two times the size of Argentina.
  • The name "Amazon" comes from the "Amazons" of Greek mythology, a race of woman warriors. In many tribes of the area, women fought alongside the men.
  • About 4 million slaves were taken from Africa to Brazil, about 40% of all in the Americas.
  • Brazil once tried to sell an aircraft carrier on eBay.
  • Brazil distributes women's breast milk around the country to babies whose mothers can't provide it for them.
  • Brazil was the only independent South American country to send ground troops to fight in WW2, with over 25,000 soldiers.
  • In 2010, a clown called "Tiririca" announced he would run for Congress in Brazil. He became the most-voted-for congressman of the election.
  • Brazil's government spent US$53 million in public funds for Pope Francis' visit of 2013.
  • The Bororo people of Brazil are one of the few groups of people where all have the same blood type: "O".
  • In 2013, the world's 7th richest person, Brazilian Eike Batista, lost his US$30 billion fortune and now owes US$1 billion.
  • 35%of men from rural Brazil have had sex with an animal, a study found.
  • Replicas of the Statue of Liberty have been erected in Pakistan, Malaysia, Taiwan, Brazil and even China.
  • The revolution that transformed Brazil into a republic was so uneventful that the few witnesses present didn't know it happened and the dethroned Emperor didn't even care.
  • The Earth's magnetic field has been steadily weakening over the past 180 years, specially around Brazil and Argentina.
  • There's an Island in Brazil where civilians are forbidden to go: it has up to 5 snakes per square meter.
  • When the World Cup was hosted in the U.S. in 1994, they only spent US$30 million on infrastructure improvements. For the 2014 World Cup, Brazil spent US$11 billion.
  • The main exporter of Brazil nuts is not Brazil. It's Bolivia.
  • There's a 10,000-seat replica of Solomon's Temple in Sao Paulo, Brazil.
  • Rio de Janeiro's beaches have 1.7 million times the disease causing viruses of what would be considered hazardous on a California beach.
  • There's a prison in Brazil that allows inmates to pedal stationary bicycles, providing electricity to a nearby city in exchange for reduced sentences.
  • Half of the top 20 cities in the world with the highest murder rates are in Brazil.
  • There's a city in Brazil called "Nao-Me-Toque" meaning "Don't Touch Me."
  • 3 of the 5 wealthiest people in Brazil got rich off beer.
  • 15,000 billboards were taken down in 2006 when Sao Paulo, Brazil, banned outdoor advertising.
  • Indonesia has the world's highest rate of deforestation, with Brazil as a close second.
  • 8 of the 12 host cities for the 2014 FIFA World Cup in Brazil are among the 50 most violent cities in the world.
  • Brazilian prisoners can reduce their sentence by 4 days for every book they read and write a report on.
  • Brazilian athletes funded their trip to the 1932 Olympics by selling coffee along the way.
  • In 1958, a rhinoceros was a candidate in the city council elections in Sao Paulo, Brazil.
  • While most of the Amazon rainforest is in Brazil (60%), it's also in Peru (13%), Colombia (10%), Venezuela,  Ecuador, Bolivia and three countries.
  • The largest free rock concert ever had 4.2 million people. It was held by Rod Stewart in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
  • The largest population of Catholics in the world is not in Italy nor Spain. It's in Brazil: 123 million, 64% of its population.
  • Brazil's Congress in 2016 includes suspects accused of murder and drug trafficking, a judo champ and a clown.
  • A gram of cocaine costs €207 in Australia but just €9 in Brazil.
  • Henry Ford tried to build an American industrialist utopia in the Brazilian jungle, "Fordlandia", to secure a source of cultivated rubber for his cars.
  • Every ten minutes, someone is murdered in Brazil.
  • In Brazil, "Rio" is pronounced "Hio."
  • Spanish and Brazilian women only spend about an hour and a half a week on housework, while French women spend almost no time on it.
  • There is a stadium in Brazil in which the midfield line lies 
  • on the Equator, making each team defend 
  • one hemisphere.
  • Tumucumaque National Park, situated in northwestern Brazil inside the Amazon Rainforest, is the world's largest tropical forest park. It's bigger than Belgium.
  • The bones of Nazi war criminal Josef Mengele are used in forensic medical courses in Sao Paulo, Brazil.
  • Piranha soup is a popular aphrodisiac in Brazil.
  • Jean Cousin has been said to have discovered the New World in 1488, four years before Christopher Columbus, when he landed in Brazil around the mouth of Amazon, 
  • but this remains unproven.
  • The first Carnival in Brazil dates back as far as 1723.
  • Paraguay and Brazil's Itaipu Dam is the hydroelectric plant that produces more energy in the world, setting a new world record in 2016.
  • Within 6 months of the 2016 Rio Olympics, Brazil's Maracana Stadium was abandoned, had its power cut off, was invaded by worms and was missing nearly 10% of the stadium's 78,000 seats.
  • There's an underground river 4 KM (2.4 mi) beneath the Amazon River in Brazil, that might be as long, but hundreds of times wider.
  • The state of Rio Grande do Sul has only 5% of Brazil's population but provides 70% of its fashion models.
  • For the Rio Olympics, 70,000 families were displaced.
  • Brazilians attested to showering more frequently than anybody else in the world with 12 times a week, a survey found.
  • Wallace Souza, a Brazilian TV personality that hosted a true crimes show, arranged murders himself to get the inside scoop and boost ratings.
  • As many as 60 tribes remain largely uncontacted in the Amazon, or live in voluntary isolation.
  • There's a colony in Brazil founded by 2,000 to 4,000 Confederate refugees who left the U.S. after losing the Civil War.
  • Sex change surgeries are free under Brazil's public health system since 2008.

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