Adriana Brasileiro – Bloomberg, 03/31/2011
Brazil’s growing reliance on imported Chinese manufactured goods is threatening producers in Latin America’s biggest economy, said James Bacchus, a former U.S. congressman and World Trade Organization official.
Chinese demand for Brazilian raw materials such as iron ore and soybeans enabled the Asian nation to overtake the U.S. as Brazil’s biggest trading partner in 2009. Imports from China are accelerating in 2011, climbing 47 percent in the first two months of the year to $4.7 billion, or almost 16 percent of all Brazil’s purchases, compared with 14 percent in the same period last year, Trade Ministry data show.
“There is increasing concern about the potential of deindustrialization,” Bacchus, who now serves as legal counsel for Brazil on trade disputes at the WTO, said this week at the Bloomberg Brazil Economic Summit in Sao Paulo. “We are going to see this be part of the debate within Brazil about trade and about how to deal with trade with China.”
Posted by Brazil Institute 
Latin America’s blind love with China may be over
September 8, 2011Andres Oppenheimer – Miami Herald, 09/08/2011
After a decade of record Latin American exports to China, which helped the region grow significantly despite the recent global recession, there are signs that the honeymoon may be coming to an end.
Growing numbers or Latin American business leaders and trade experts are complaining that China is buying almost exclusively raw materials from the region, while refusing to purchase more sophisticated — and expensive — Latin American goods, thus preventing the region from having more diversified economies.
In addition, Chinese companies are bringing dubious business practices to the region, exploiting workers and destroying the environment, they say.
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