China-Brazil ties set to reach new heights

Despite suffering some setbacks during the Brazilian presidential election earlier this year, China-Brazil ties have improved thanks to the frequent high-level visits, including Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro's visit to China at the end of October and President Xi Jinping's just-concluded visit to Brazil, during which he also attended the 11th BRICS Summit. In fact, bilateral relations are entering a new era.

It is mutual interest that has kept Sino-Brazilian relationship on the track of dialogue and cooperation. As a result, even amid increasing trade frictions and the United States resorting to trade protectionism, the China-Brazil trade volume reached $111 billion in 2018 and China has remained Brazil's largest trade partner over the past decade. Also, Brazil had a trade surplus of more than $29 billion, up 46.2 percent year-on-year, against China last year.

According to the Foreign Investment Newsletter that Brazil's Economic Ministry released in April, from 2003 to the first quarter of 2019, China accounted for 37 percent of the total foreign direct investment in Brazil with $71 billion and became the largest source of foreign direct investment in that country, exceeding the US' $58 billion.

China and Brazil have mutual interest in strengthening cooperation in regional affairs, especially trade, and global governance, as both are important emerging economies and member states of multilateral organizations such as BRICS and G20.

During his visit to China, Bolsonaro said China and Brazil were "born to walk together". And China is committed to developing Sino-Brazilian relations from a strategic and long-term perspective. Thanks to their comprehensive strategic partnership, the two countries have embarked on the path of progressive co-development, and their cooperation will lead to a brighter future for both sides.

Increasing global trade frictions have prompted China and Brazil to not only strengthen their trade in farm products but also diversify their pragmatic cooperation. The agriculture sector has played an important role in the complementary China-Brazil trade and in boosting co-development. Brazil is a major exporter of farm products and China the largest importer of such products, including those from Brazil. Take last year's bilateral soy trade for example-more than 66 million tons of soy from Brazil made up 75 percent of China's total soy imports. Also, Brazil has become an overseas destination for China's strategic agricultural investment.

The trade frictions between China and the US that intensified last year helped boost China's agricultural imports from Brazil. This, along with China's ongoing economic transformation and consumption structure upgrading, demonstrates the significance of strengthening cooperation for China and Brazil, as well as establishing a long-term, stable, and win-win strategic partnership in agriculture.

Cooperation in the agricultural field should lead to not only widening market access but also establishing a new pattern of complete industrial chains, comprising agricultural product processing, storage facilities, logistics, germplasm improvement, biotechnology, and research and development.

China and Brazil are taking measures to diversify and expand cooperation in fields such as agriculture, mineral resources, energy, telecommunications and technological innovation. And they have made achievements in the fields of aerospace, nanotechnology and renewable energy, especially the China-Brazil Earth Resource Satellite-4A, scheduled to be launched at the end of this year, which will be a shining example of South-South cooperation.

Moreover, the China-proposed Belt and Road Initiative provides a new platform for China-Brazil cooperation. Although Brazil has not signed a Belt and Road cooperation agreement, Brazilian Vice-President Hamilton Mourao said in June that Brazil is willing to facilitate synergy between its investment partnership projects and the initiative.

China and Brazil share the need for economic transformation and industrial upgrading, so they should promote industrial coordination and synergy. Since Brazil is a big market with a strong influence in Latin America, a good industrial system and advantages in human resources, China-Brazil cooperation can become a driving force for deepening cooperation between China and Latin America.

But the US seems intent on resorting to the "Monroe Doctrine" to prevent "external interference" in Latin America, except from the US itself, and regards China's increasing trade with and investment in the region as a threat, and therefore is trying to drive a wedge between China and Latin America by, for example, pressuring Latin American countries to not use China's 5G technology.

But Latin American countries including Brazil, thanks to their pluralistic diplomacy, can balance their relations with China and the US. Besides, compared with the US' unilateralism, China is further opening up its economy and strengthening multilateral and win-win cooperation. And the development of China-Brazil cooperation as well as Sino-Latin American cooperation does not target a third party and cannot be affected by a third party.

He Shuangrong is a researcher and Sun Hongbo is an associate researcher at the Institute of Latin American Studies, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. The views don't necessarily represent those of China Daily.