In Brazil, Xi Jinping cultivates a friend as he braces for Trump
Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. RIO DE JANEIRO : As Xi Jinping prepares for a thorny trade relationship with President-elect Donald Trump, he is cultivating a rapport with someone he calls a like-minded good friend, Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. The populist leftist shares Xi’s goals of checking America’s global economic dominance.
When the two met here this week at a gathering of the Group of 20 largest economies, da Silva grabbed the strongman Chinese leader to pull him in for a hug. The warmth in the relationship—the two are also meeting one on one Wednesday in Brasília—is grounded in the two countries’ mutual economic needs. The resource-hungry Chinese economy depends on Brazilian iron ore, soybeans, beef, oil and other commodities to the point where Brazil is the rare country with a trade surplus with China, its biggest trading partner.
Brazil in turn has an appetite for a variety of Chinese semiconductors, fertilizers, steel and auto parts, chemicals and vehicles. China’s ties to Brazil—with the largest economy in Latin America—could help Beijing offset the blow from Trump tariffs to its already-struggling economy. The links also showcase how alternative trade routes can circumvent the U.S.
For example, China could amp up imports of soybeans from Brazil and limit its intake from U.S. farmers in a trade fight. While leaders are concerned that Trump’s policies could disrupt trade flows globally, Xi and da Silva, who is often known as Lula, are just as intent on keeping goods moving.
“There is little the U.S. can do at this juncture to reverse that trend," said Margaret Myers, who follows China’s relationship with Latin America at Inter-American Dialogue, a Washington policy group. Others echoed
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