BRICS summit marks recovery of China-Brazil relations
BRASILIA, (Reuters) - Jair Bolsonaro’s repeated bashing of China on the campaign trail last year left diplomats on both sides worried he might take a wrecking ball to one of the world’s biggest trading partnerships.
But 11 months into Bolsonaro’s presidency, the visit this week of his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, for the BRICS summit looks set to complete a repair of the relationship.
Presidents of the group of major emerging economies - Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa - will meet in Brazil’s capital on Wednesday and Thursday for what are widely expected to be low-key, technical discussions.
The five leaders will focus on stimulating investment in their countries amid a slowing world economy, while patching up disagreements on issues such as Venezuela and Bolivia, diplomats said.
Before the summit, Xi and Bolsonaro will hold bilateral meetings this morning.
“It’s going to be the endpoint of a process of making up after what was the worst crisis of the relationship between Brazil and China of the past decades,” said Oliver Stuenkel, an international relations professor at the Getulio Vargas Foundation, a Brazilian university.
China will likely seek to signal that it is an “all-weather friend” to Brazil, Stuenkel said.
China, which is Brazil’s largest trading partner with $98.7 billion in two-way trade last year, buys vast quantities of commodities from South America’s largest country. Chinese demand has surged for soy and other farm products amid China’s trade war with the United States.
In the lead-up to the last year’s election, things looked very different. “The Chinese are not buying in Brazil. They are buying Brazil,” Bolsonaro said on repeated occasions.
But the far-right former army captain has struck a more conciliatory tone since taking power. There have been high-level meetings and friendly gestures.
China has authorized exports from 45 Brazilian meat plants, helped by visits earlier in the year by Vice
President Hamilton Mourao and Agriculture Minister Tereza Cristina Dias.
Chinese state oil companies CNOOC and CNODC were the only bidders other than Brazil’s own staterun Petroleo Brasileiro SA in a massive oil auction last week, following an invitation made by Bolsonaro during his visit to the Asian nation.
Senior Chinese officials told reporters last week they hope the summit will help “inject confidence into a worried international community” and “uphold multilateralism in the face of unprecedented challenges and rising protectionism.”