Brazil is gearing up for a record trade surplus with China, with a positive trade balance of US$24.3 billion in the first six months of 2023. The previous record, set in 2020, was US$33.6 billion.
By the end of June, Brazilian exports to China totalled US$49.8 billion, an increase of 5.9 percent over the previous year. Chinese exports dipped 8.8 percent over the same timeframe, totalling US$25.5 billion, according to data from the Foreign Trade Secretariat of the Brazilian Ministry of Development, Industry and Commerce.
Last year saw the highest level of trade between the two countries ever, at US$150.2 billion in total. Brazil exported US$89.4 billion of goods and services to China, with China sending US$60.7 billion in the opposite direction – giving Brazil a 2022 trade surplus of US$28.7 billion.
[See more: China’s capital city now counts Brazil as its fourth largest trade partner]
Brazilian main exports to China are primary products, with three – soybeans, crude oil and iron ore – accounting for 80 percent of the total. Soybeans (US$23.1 billion) and crude oil (US$8.7 billion) have seen respective increases of 13.8 percent and 7.93 this year, while iron ore (US$8.3 billion) exports have dipped by 6.67 percent.
Cellulose (US$1.83 billion) also saw a significant increase, up 26.4 percent. Beef (US$2.9 billion), meanwhile, dropped by 29 percent due to a brief halt in trade following an atypical case of mad cow disease in one Brazilian city. Beef exports resumed a month later, reports Reuters.
Industrial products make up China’s exports to Brazil. Between January and June 2023, Chinese companies shipped US$2.9 billion worth of valves and tubes, US$1.65 billion of telecommunications equipment, and US$1.5 billion of organo-inorganic compounds to the South American giant – along with other manufacturing equipment, machinery, and electrical appliances.
