MIGRATION
Brazil is quietly welcoming more foreigners
In 2025, Brazilian officials gave a seminar to teach migrants about their basic consumer rights. Photo: Paulo Pinto/EBC
Over the course of last year, Brazil’s Federal Revenue Service issued 401,000 fiscal identity numbers (known as CPFs) to foreign nationals, more than 10 times the total from two decades prior, in 2005. The data was obtained by Fiquem Sabendo, a freedom-of-information advocacy organization.
In Brazil, almost nothing formal happens without a CPF. The 11-digit number (created in the 1960s as a tax tool), now opens…
🔒 This was a free preview; the rest is behind our paywall
Don’t miss out! Upgrade to unlock full access. The process takes only seconds with Apple Pay or Stripe. Become a member.
Why you should subscribe
We’re here for readers who want to truly understand Brazil and Latin America — a region too often ignored or misrepresented by the international media.
Since 2017, our reporting has been powered by paid subscribers. They’re the reason we can keep a full-time team of journalists across Brazil and Argentina, delivering sharp, independent coverage every day.
If you value our work, subscribing is the best way to keep it going — and growing.
Interested in advertising with us? Get in touch.
Need a special report? We can do it.
Have an idea for an article or column? Pitch us
