Ahead of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s trip to Beijing next week, Brazil announced that China surpassed the United States as the country’s largest trading partner. Trade with China totaled $3.2 billion in April, compared with $2.8 billion in imports and exports with the US.
“The US has been Brazil’s principal trading partner for nearly 80 years, but a sudden surge in Chinese demand for Brazilian iron ore in the first quarter of this year dislodged the Americans.
“The news is the latest sign of China’s increasing challenge to US hegemony in Latin America.”
But, on a related note, China’s exports fell 22.6 percent in April from a year earlier.
Photo from Vanderlei Almeida/AFP/Getty Images.