Reinhold Stephanes

Reinhold Stephanes is a Brazilian economist and politician born in Porto Uniao, Santa Catarina, in 1939, the son of small farmers of German descent. Raised in Uniao da Vitoria and later Rio Negro before settling in Curitiba, he served five years in the army before graduating in economics from the Federal University of Parana in 1963 and specializing in economic development at the United Nations regional agency CEPAL that same year, later completing further training in public administration in Germany. He began his public career in Curitiba in the 1960s as a technical assistant in the state budget office and as an economic adviser to the Curitiba city finance department, and went on to serve as Brazil's Minister of Agriculture, Livestock and Supply from March 2007 to March 2010, as well as holding cabinet posts overseeing labour and social security across the governments of Presidents Fernando Collor de Mello, Fernando Henrique Cardoso and Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.