São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Brasília, Curitiba, Belo Horizonte e Manaus had the six biggest municipal GDP and, together, accounted for more than one-fourth of the wealth generated in the country. 

At the same time, the 27 capitals in the country generated one-third of the national wealth.

The concentration of economic activity was more commonly observed in most states located in the North and Northeast Regions, where half of the GDP of each one came from their five biggest municipalities. 

São Francisco do Conde (BA) had the biggest per capita income in the country (R$ 288,370.81) and Jacareacanga (PA), the smallest per capita income (R$ 1,721.23).

São Paulo remained as the leader in terms of gross value added of Industry and of Services, whereas Sorriso (MT) was the leader in Agriculture. On the other hand, 32.9% of the Brazilian municipalities remained very dependent on the general government, which was responsible for more then one-third of their economies. 

The Project Gross Domestic Product of Municipalities has been developed since 2000, in partnership with State Statistical Organizations, State Government Departments and the Superintendence of the Manaus Free Trade Zone (Suframa). See below some relevant information about GDP of Municipalities 2008. 

In 2008, the six municipalities with the biggest contributions to GDP in the country – all capitals – accounted for about 25.0% of the Brazilian GDP: São Paulo (SP), 11.8%; Rio de Janeiro (RJ), 5.1%; Brasília (DF), 3.9%; Curitiba (PR), 1.4%; Belo Horizonte (MG),1.4% e Manaus (AM), 1.3%. The 1313 municipalities with the lowest GDP figures (areas inhabited by 3.4% of the population) accounted for only 1% of GDP in the country. The level of concentration remained similar to those in previous years. 

The five municipalities with the smallest GDP figures in 2008 were: Areia de Baraúna (PB), São Luis do Piauí (PI), São Félix do Tocantins (TO), Santo Antônio dos Milagres (PI) e São Miguel da Baixa Grande (PI), in decreasing order. The aggregation of these GDP figures represented approximately 0.001% of the overall national GDP. 

In most states of the North and Northeast Regions, half of the wealth is generated by five municipalities only 

In most of the states of the North and Northeast Regions, the main five municipalities of each state held more than half of the state GDP. Exceptions were Tocantins (44.7%) and Bahia (47.4%). The Southeast did not present a specific pattern, and the five biggest municipalities of Espírito Santo and Rio de Janeiro concentrated over 65% of the GDP in their states. in the South and in the Central-West, this concentration was lower, except in Mato Grosso do Sul (55.6%).

In 2008, the five biggest municipalities of Amazonas accounted for 88.1% of the state GDP, which had the biggest spatial concentration of income in the country, followed by Amapá (87.6%) and Roraima (85.4%). On the other hand, Santa Catarina (35.5%), Rio Grande do Sul (36.0%) and Minas Gerais (36.7%) had the smallest concentration of income. 

In 2008, the 27 capitals held one-third of GDP

In 2008, Brazilian capitals accounted for 33.9% of the Brazilian GDP. Capitals of the North Region accounted for 2.4% of this amount; the ones in the Northeast, for 4.5%; in the Southeast, 19.0%; in the South, for 2.9%; in the Central West, for 5.2%.  In 2008, the participation of capitals in the composition of national GDP reached its lowest level since 2004.

Among the capitals, São Paulo had the biggest GDP and Palmas (Tocantins), the smallest one.  Florianópolis (SC) was the only capital which did not feature in the first position in its respective state, being third to Joinville and Itajaí. The states of the North and Northeast Regions presented significant economic dependence on their capitals, especially Roraima and Amazonas; the latter was the state which depended most on its capital, Manaus, a municipality which accounted for more than 80% of GDP in the state.  Santa Catarina was the least dependent state; its capital contributed, in the whole series, with approximately 7.0% of the GDP in the state.  With the social development of the area known as Norte Fluminense, the state of Rio de Janeiro had decreased its dependence on the capital.  

This area represented 50.5% of the state economy in 2004 and 45.1% in 2008.

Petroleum still stimulated the economy in Campos dos Goytacazes (RJ)

From 2007 to 2008, Campos dos Goytacazes (RJ) recorded the biggest increase of percent participation in GDP in the country, among the municipalities with at least 0.5% of the national GDP, due to the increase of participation of petroleum and natural gas and to the rise of petroleum price, in reais (Table 7). 

The municipality of São Paulo, with an economy linked to that of the state, lost in participation mainly in some segments, such as metallurgy – non-iron metals – pharmaceutical products, industry of office machinery and computer equipment.  In services, there were losses in some items of retail trade (retailers of vehicles and distribution of fuels).

The municipality of Rio de Janeiro has faced decrease of participation in the series; in 2008, the subsector of trade and maintenance and repair services was the main responsible for this change.

S. Francisco do Conde (BA) has the biggest per capita GDP in the country (R$288,370.81)

The ten municipalities with the biggest per capita GDP have low demographic density.  São Francisco do Conde (BA) housed the second biggest refinery in terms of installed capacity of petroleum refining in the country.   In Porto Real (RJ) there was car industry.  Triunfo (RS), in the metropolitan area of Porto Alegre, was the headquarters of an important petrochemical plant.  In Quissamã (RJ), the main activity was the extraction of petroleum and natural gas.   Confins (MG) has gained more positions since 2005 when its international airport received msot flights headed for Belo Horizonte. Louveira (SP) held distribution centers of major companies.

Araporã (MG), in the area known as Triângulo Mineiro (Minas Triangle), had the biggest hydroelectric plant in the state, with installed capacity of 2 082 megawatts - MW. In Campos de Júlio (MT) economy was concentrated in the agricultural production of soybeans (in grain) and corn (in grain). Anchieta (ES) was characterized by pelleting and sintering of iron ore.  Jambeiro (SP), close to São José dos Campos (SP) and other cities located i the area of medium Vale do Paraíba and North coast, had its economic basis integrated to that of these municipalities. Their highlights, in 2008, were the subsectors of manufacturing of metal products and food industry.   In the same year, the Brazilian per capita GDP was R$ 15 989.5.

Jacareanga, in Pará, has the smallest per capita GDP in the country:  R$ 1,721.23

In 2008, Jacareacanga (PA), on the border between Amazonas and Mato Grosso, had the smallest per capita GDP among the 5,564 municipalities in the country (R$ 1,721.23) and about 60.0% of its economy depended on the general government. Besides, 60% of its territory was formed by environment conservation areas and indigenous lands.

In the 56 municipalities with the smallest per capita GDP figures, this indicator was of up to R$ 2 442.10. They were located in Pará (15), Maranhão (15), Piauí (15), Alagoas (2) and Bahia (9).

Vitória (ES) is the Brazilian capital with the biggest per capita GDP

In relation to capitals, the highlights were Vitória (ES) with the biggest per capita GDP, followed by Brasília (Federal District), São Paulo (SP), Porto Alegre (RS) and Rio de Janeiro (RJ). It is possible to observe that although Vitória had the biggest per capita GDP among the capitals, corresponding to 4.5 times the Brazilian per capita GDP, it had only the third biggest one in Espírito Santo, being preceded by Anchieta and Presidente Kennedy.

Sorriso (MT) has the highest value added of agriculture In 2008, 189 municipalities aggregated about 25.0% of the value added of agriculture in Brazil and 665 municipalities aggregated only 1.0% of the gross value added of agriculture.  The 13 municipalities which recorded the highest figures for value added of agriculture made up about 5.0% of the total (Table 11).

The favorable international scenario and the good climatic conditions benefited soybeans and corn crops in 2008. Sorriso, Sapezal, Campo Verde, Nova Mutum, Primavera do Leste, Campo Novo do Parecis and Diamantino, municipalities in the state of Mato Grosso, recorded high production value for soybeans (grain), corn (grain) and herbaceous cotton (seed). The municipality of Sorriso was the major grain producer for the second consecutive year.  

São Paulo (SP) had the highest gross value added in industry. In 2008, 59 municipalities generated half of the gross value added of industry. In the same year, 2 513 municipalities accounted for 1.0% of the gross value added of industry and held 9.7% of the population.

In 2008, São Paulo (SP) remained as the main industrial area in the country, with relative participation of 8.7%.  Campos dos Goytacazes (RJ) was in second place in the industrial  ranking  of the country since 2005 (2.4%) and remained in this position  until 2008 (3.4%).

Rio de Janeiro (RJ) was in the third position in the ranking, with 2.0% in 2008. The decrease of participation in relation to 2007 occurred due to the reduction of the average electricity fare and of the  gain of participation of municipalities in the state production of petroleum, steel, trucks and other means of transportation.

São Paulo (SP) also had the highest gross value added in services

In 2008, with 36 municipalities, the city reached half of the value added of services and 27.7% of the population.  In the same year, 1,314 municipalities accounted for 1.0% of the gross value added of industry services and held 2.9% of the population.

Services were highly concentrated in the Brazilian capitals, reaching 40.2% in 2008. Among the 36 municipalities which aggregated 50.0% of the gross value added of services, there were 16 capitals.

In 32.9% of the municipalities, general government remained responsible for one third of the economy 

Out of the 5 564 Brazilian municipalities, 1 832 (32.9%) had less than 1/3 of their economies depending on the general government.  In 2008, the weight of gross value added of general government in the GDP of Brazil was 13.4%.  This indicator had been increasing since 2004 (12.6%).

In five municipalities, the participation of general government in relation to the local GDP was above 70.%, in 2008: Uiramutã (RR, 78.7%), Poço Dantas (PB, 70.8%), Santo Antônio dos Milagres (PI, 70.8%), Areia de Baraúnas (PB, 70.5%) and Santarém (PB, 70.3%).General government also had a level of participation above 38.8% in all the municipalities of Roraima.  The relevance of general government was also evident in the municipalities of Amapá, above 40.3% in all of them, except in Serra do Navio, where the contribution of industry (53.6%) to GDP surpassed that of the general government (13.8%).

In ten years, participation in GDP decreased among the 37 most populated municipalities

Between 1999 and 2008, the 37 municipalities with more than 500 thousand inhabitants faced decrease of participation in GDP, whereas the 229 medium-sized municipalities (from 100,001 to 500 thousand inhabitants) recorded increase of participation. Among medium-sized municipalities, the highlights were:  Campos Goytacazes (RJ, 0.6 percentage points), Santos (SP, 0.4 pp), Betim (MG, 0.3 pp), Vitória (ES, 0.2 pp), Itajaí (SC, 0.2 pp), Serra (ES, 0.2 pp), Macaé (RJ, 0.1 pp), Cabo Frio (RJ, 0.1 pp) and Parauapebas (PA, 0.1 pp).