Dilma Rousseff, Brazil’s president, has launched a R$133bn ($65.6bn) stimulus package to spur investment in the country’s creaking infrastructure and shore up ailing investor confidence in the second-largest emerging market economy.

In the first of a series of announcements, Ms Rousseff said the government would sell concessions in nine highways and 12 railways. “We are starting with railways and roads but obviously we will take care of airports, ports and waterways,” Ms Rousseff told politicians and businessmen in Brasília.

The economy expanded 7.5 per cent in 2010, the fastest in more than two decades, but last year slowed to 2.7 per cent as inadequate infrastructure and a shortage of skilled labour stifled industry. This year it is expected to grow by 2 per cent or less.