By Liz Lee and Laurie Chen
BEIJING (Reuters) – China will host a summit that includes its key Latin American trade partners this week in an effort to advance influence and partnerships in the region, as Beijing and Washington try to defuse their trade war.
Latin American and Caribbean officials including the presidents of Brazil, Colombia and Chile are set to attend the China-CELAC Forum ministerial meeting in Beijing on Tuesday.
Bilateral trade with the bloc was worth $427 billion from January to September 2024, according to Chinese data.
China’s President Xi Jinping will deliver a speech to the summit. The last time Xi addressed the forum was at the first of such meeting 10 years ago.
The China-CELAC Forum challenges long-standing American geopolitical and economic dominance in the region, which the Trump administration has sought to counter, and takes place after a weekend of high-stakes trade talks between the U.S. and China that ended on a positive note.
U.S. officials touted a “deal” to reduce the U.S. trade deficit, while Chinese officials said both had reached “important consensus” and agreed to launch another new economic dialogue forum. Both will release a joint statement on Monday.
China has been trying to marshal a global coalition against what it called an “abuse of tariffs” by the United States.
Since the world’s two largest economies imposed steep tariffs well above 100% on each other’s goods last month, China has reached out to Southeast Asia and Central Asia calling on its trade partners to hold the line against “unilateral bullying” and to uphold multilateralism.
China also made progress on trade issues with the European Union, agreeing to discuss setting minimum prices on Chinese-made electric vehicles.
The China-CELAC Forum, an intergovernmental cooperation platform between China and Latin American and Caribbean nations, has been a vehicle to deepen dialogue between China and the bloc over trade, investment and infrastructure cooperation under China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).
Highlighting tensions between China and the U.S. in the region has been the Panama Canal, which U.S. President Donald Trump has threatened to take back.
The U.S.-based BlackRock consortium’s $23-billion deal to acquire Hong Kong-based CK Hutchison’s port operations near the Panama Canal, which Trump hailed as “reclaiming” the waterway, triggered Beijing’s concerns and prompted a regulatory review.
COMMODITIES TRADE
China is the primary buyer of raw materials from Latin America, including copper, iron ore and minerals, but its trade with Brazil could feature this week.
Co-inciding with the summit, Beijing will also welcome Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva’s state visit on Tuesday. More than a dozen bilateral signings were expected.
China is Brazil’s largest export market by some length, a trade dominated by commodities like soybeans, iron ore and crude oil.
Last year, China bought $37 billion worth of soybeans from Brazil, making it China’s primary soybean supplier as the world’s largest soybean buyer diversifies away from the United States. China resumed imports of Brazilian soybean shipments last week from five firms previously suspended over phytosanitary concerns.
In a social media post, Chilean President Gabriel Boric confirmed attending the summit in Beijing and said he would meet Xi.
The meeting could discuss business interests from Chinese firms in the world’s No. 2 lithium producer after metals group Tsingshan said it remains keen on investment opportunities in Chile’s downstream lithium sector.
On other fronts, more infrastructure cooperation could be highlighted as the high-profile meeting paves a path towards the BRICS Summit to be hosted in Rio de Janeiro in July.
Unlike Panama, which exited the BRI earlier this year, Colombia has ambitions to join China’s flagship BRI programme, following the footsteps of Peru which BRI-linked Port of Chancay was inaugurated half a year ago to serve better maritime connectivity between China and South America.
(Reporting by Liz Lee and Laurie Chen; additional reporting by Lisandra Paraguassu, Manuela Andreoni, Julia Symmes Cobbs and Ella Cao; Editing by Michael Perry)
