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.