Brazil casts a bigger spotlight on China
Brazil casts a bigger spotlight on China
Ambassador Sergio Amaral and Consultant Claudio Frischtak evaluated Brazil’s competitiveness and trade integration with China during AS/COA’s panel discussion “Brazil-China Economic Relations” on October 15.
As China becomes the largest export market for Brazil and as Chinese investment in the South American nation expands into the manufacturing and service sectors, Brazilian companies are also looking for ways to have a bigger impact in the Middle Kingdom.
Presently, only 0.06 percent of Brazil's total investment outflow is targeted at China. According to the latest survey by the China-Brazil Business Council, only 57 Brazilian companies are currently operating in China.
About half of them are service providers, such as Bank of Brazil and the law firm Felsberg and Associates. Twenty-eight percent, such as aircraft maker Embraer, are in manufacturing, with 21 percent involved in natural resources, such as Vale and Petrobras.
Claudio Frischtak, a consultant to CBBC, said the lopsided ratio in the amount of Chinese investments in Brazil to Brazilian investments in China is due to historic reasons.
"In the 1980s, the Chinese looked to improve efficiency in manufacturing and in those days, there were real opportunities for Brazilian companies to transfer their manufacturing knowledge and become a partner in the Chinese development," Frischtak told a conference held on Monday at the Council of the Americas in New York.
"Brazilian companies did not do that because they were fundamentally occupied by hyper inflation and other problems. They were struggling to survive. It was a lost decade," said Frischtak, who is also president of consultancy Inter.B.
When Brazilian companies were ready to invest in the Chinese market at the beginning of this century, they discovered a different China….
