Annual Industrial Survey shows that the food manufacturing sector was the largest employer, with 2.1 million people employed
The workforce in industrial companies was 8.7 million people in 2024. The data is from “PIA (Annual Industrial Survey) – Company and Product” and was released this Wednesday (June 24, 2026) by (Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics). Here’s it (2 MB – PDF).
The food manufacturing sector was the largest employer in the period, with 2.1 million people employed. Next came manufacturing of clothing and accessories (551,800), manufacturing of metal products, except machinery and equipment (517,100) and manufacturing of motor vehicles, trailers and bodies (491,900).
Brazil had 358,400 industrial companies with at least one person employed in 2024.
Industrial companies generated R$6.8 trillion in RLV (Net Sales Revenue) in 2024, with R$483.0 billion in extractive industries and R$6.3 trillion in manufacturing industries, and paid R$481.1 billion in salaries, withdrawals and other remuneration. The VTI (Industrial Transformation Value) generated was R$2.6 trillion.
