The date for requiring a visa to enter Brazil for holders of joint passports from Australia, Canada and the United States has been postponed to April 10, 2024. The new date has been formalized by Decree No. 11,875 , published in an additional issue of the Official Journal of the Union this Thursday, January 4. The text signed by the President of the Republic, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, modifies Decree No. 11.692, published in September 2023, which provided for the start of visa collection on January 10.

The extension aims to complete the system implementation process and avoid starting implementation in a period close to the peak tourist season at the end and beginning of the year. The intention is to ensure a safe introduction of the measure, without consequences for the tourism sector.

Reciprocity

The policy of reciprocity is a historical mechanism of Brazilian diplomacy. In September 2023, when the previous version of the decree was published, Foreign Minister Mauro Vieira explained the concept .

“In the previous government, the obligation for Americans, Canadians, Australians and Japanese was suspended. The measure was granted free of charge. Without reciprocity. Brazilians continued to need a visa to travel to these country,” he recalled.

“At the beginning of the government, on the instructions of President Lula, we reinstated visas. We called on these countries to negotiate. Japan accepted and we negotiated. The others affirmed that this was not possible according to the legislation of every single one of them,” Vieira says.

The minister stressed that the federal government is always willing to negotiate visa exemptions on the basis of reciprocity. “In other words, the country that accepts Brazilians to travel without a physical visa, we will give them the same advantage,” he explained.

In May 2023, President Lula was in Japan and reached an agreement to exempt Brazilians entering that country and Japanese arriving in Brazil from visas. The exemption measure came into force in September last year .

By: Planalto