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President Hu's trip to improve trade ties
By Dai Yan (China Daily)
Updated: 2004-11-09 00:20

Chinese President Hu Jintao's tour of four Latin American countries is expected to further improve bilateral trade ties.

The Chinese President will visit Brazil, Argentina, Chile and Cuba from November 11 to 23, during which he will also attend APEC's 12th informal leadership meeting.

The tour will touch on many important issues in the development of trade between China and the four countries, which will help forge a steady, long-term and all-round Sino-Latin American relationship, analysts believed.

Hu may talk about the issue of market economy status (MES) with the four countries, said Wang Youli, an expert from the Chinese Academy of International Trade and Economic Co-operation.

MES has been an key issue in State leaders' meetings with foreign counterparts since the beginning of this year, in a bid to create a fair business environment for Chinese goods, Wang said.

MES is used when ruling on anti-dumping cases and China is currently regarded as a non-market economy, despite the progress the nation has made in building a market economy. In fact, Chile and Brazil are two of the top ten countries launching the most anti-dumping cases against China.

The possibility of signing free trade agreement with these countries will be another major issue, Wang believed.

China and Chile launched the FTA talks last year, and pledged to conclude feasibility studies this year.

There are also discussions about a FTA between the South American Common Market and China. The group includes Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay. Chile and Bolivia are associate members.

The visit will see China sign a number of agreements and other documents with the four countries.

Newspapers in Argentina reported Argentine President Nestor Kirchner will announce an investment accord with China that will bring in US$20 billion in capital from the Asian giant for infrastructure and energy projects.

If the investments materialize, it would be the first large-scale injection of capital in Argentina since the economy's collapse in late 2001, reports said.

"Leaders of these countries will show great interest in promotion of Chinese investment to their countries," Wang said.

Latin America has been a key investment destination for China.

Around US$1.04 billion flowed into Latin America in 2003, accounting for 36.5 per cent of the year's total, according to statistics from the Ministry of Commerce. Latin America had US$4.62 billion, or 14 per cent of China's accumulated outbound investment.

Chinese officials will discuss the soybean trade with the Argentinian and Brazillian governments and the sugar trade with Cuba. China is already the biggest buyer of Argentina and Brazil's soybeans, the two countries' top export. China mainly imports raw sugar from the Cuba while exporting rice, mechanical and electronic products, medicine, light industrial and textile products.

Trade relations between Latin American countries and China have heated up in recent years.

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula Da Silva visited China in May this year with 18 ministers and 500 business people from all major industries and then in June Argentinean President Nestor Kirchner came to China with several ministers and 270 business people.

In 2003 China's import volume increased 40 per cent, while its imports from Latin America soared 79.1 per cent, the highest growth rate among all areas of the world.

Last year Brazil had a trade surplus of US$3.7 billion with China and Argentina had US$2.3 billion.



 
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