Honouring India’s invitation to be
chief guest on the 71st Republic Day, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro
arrived on a four-day, first state visit to India on Jan 24th. Bolsonaro is third Brazilian President to
grace the Republic Day parade after President Fernando Cardaso in 1996 and Lula
de Silva in 2004.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi who
met President Bolsonaro along the sidelines of the 11th BRICS summit
at Brazil extended India’s invitation. This invitation drew immediate flak from
the left-wing leaders who derided Bolsonaro for his misogynistic, homophobic retorts.
Bolsonaro, a former military officer, who swept 2018 Presidential elections
took charge on Jan 1st 2019. Months into presidency, he derided
climate change theories and revamped the environment policies. Deemed as “Trump
of the Tropics”, he sullied his own image after a spat with French President
Emmanuel Macron over the unrelenting Amazon Forest fires and rebuking his wife.
Around the same time, Brazil along with Australia and Guatemala complained to
WTO against India’s subsides to sugarcane farmers and demanded setting up of a
panel to investigate these charges which are in violation of global trading
rules. Brazil has been India’s competitor in Sugar exports and this move has
clearly created some rifts between both the countries. Against these
contentious developments, determined to deepen India’s footprint in the Latin
America, which has been the backyard of the US and the expanding domain of the
China, Modi made the first move.
Unlike his dominant leftist
predecessors Bolsonaro wooed the US. He dumped the traditional South-South
cooperation, a common thread that brought the three giants- Brazil, South
Africa and India together under the IBSA (India Brazil South Africa) forum.
Devoid of representative voting rights in the global bodies, countries which
are non-aligned, formerly colonised, cold war nationalities also referred to as
“Third World” countries emerged as Global South. This shared geopolitical
vision has been corner stone of multilateral arrangements like BRICS and G-4.
Global South is actively promoted by the leftist regimes in Latin America (as
they believed that capitalist globalisation has severely impacted their
economies).
But Bolsonaro had a different
vision for Brazil. Preferring to be part of the league of developed countries,
OECD (Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development) Bolsonaro hankered
for the US support. To resurrect economy, Bolsonaro pledged to intensify trade
ties with countries with compatible ideology-Israel, Poland, Hungary, Italy and
the US. Having ensconced America in protectionism Trump hardly bothered to
respond to Bolsonaro’s overtures and threatened of tariffs on steel.
Interestingly, despite Trump’s tepid response, Bolsonaro sought pride in
Western identity. Netanyahu mired in
corruption scandals and elections, Italy wading through ouster of coalition
government Bolsonaro was forced to make fresh changes in his approach.
Bolsonaro ascended to power on the
promise of reviving the economy reeling under slump, slowdown and corruption.
He towed a tough anti-Chinese stand saying, “the Chinese are not buying in
Brazil but they are buying Brazil” visited Taiwan during his Presidential
campaign. Brazil reaped benefits of the US-China trade war. After China stopped
importing Soybeans from the US it placed orders from Brazil. Catering to the
interests of the agricultural community and businesses, Bolsonaro steadily
dumped the anti-Chinese rhetoric and even announced visa-free entry to China
and Indian short-term business travellers. To have a wider market access,
Brazil started looking towards Asia. Giving a massive fillip to Indo-Brazilian
ties, accompanied by 8 ministers, 4 members of parliament and 62-member
business delegation, Bolsonaro landed in India.
India and Brazil, both vibrant
democracies and pluralistic societies share similar developmental and global
aspirations. Brazil the largest country in South America with population of over
200 million and $1.8 trillion economy is a rich in minerals, oil, natural gas
and largest producer of ethanol. In 2006, countries elevated ties to strategic
partnership. As of 2018, bilateral trade touched $8.2 billion skewed in favour
of Brazil, which exports crude oil, gold, vegetable oil, sugar, bulk mineral
and ores as opposed to India’s agro-chemicals, synthetic yarn, auto parts,
pharmaceuticals and petroleum products. Indian investments in Brazil account
for $6 billion while Brazilian invested $1 billion in automobiles, IT, energy,
mining and engineering sector in India.
Modi’s successful proactive foreign
policy transformed India’s outreach perceptibly but South America was still out
of its radar. South America endowed with rich natural resources and huge market
potential can be an ideal ground for India’s manufacturing sector. For long, Middle East has been the biggest
source of India’s energy supplies. Escalating tensions and the looming
uncertainties are keeping India on tenterhook. India is slowly diversifying its
imports. Endowed with rich natural resources, South America can be a promising
energy exporter. India has also set an ambitious target of 175GW renewable
energy by 2022. Brazil can be its best bet to achieve this target as it has the
most advanced ethanol program in the World.
Brazil, is among the most influential countries in the region is part of
two influential blocs- Mercosur and Prosur. Mercosur, is South American trading
block also called the Southern Common Market promotes free trade. It has four
full members- Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay, seven associate members
and two observers which include New Zealand and Mexico. Prosur (Forum for
Progress of South America) a recently formed regional bloc for economic and
regional cooperation is predominantly right-wing, includes eight South American
countries-Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, Paraguay and
Peru. Brazil played a crucial role in
India-Mercosur Preferential Treaty Agreement (PTA) which increased India’s
access to Latin America. India’s strategic economic cooperation with Brazil can
complementarily enhance connect with the continent as well.
As of now Foreign office
consultations, Joint Working Groups and Trade Monitoring mechanisms are used to
carry forward dialogue and cooperation in various sectors. To deepen the
strategic partnership, during Bolsonaro’s visit, countries signed an “Action
Plan”. The Indo-Brazil Joint Commission for political, economic, scientific,
technological and cultural cooperation will reconvene every two years and
monitor the implementation of the same. To review the progress, the plan is
divided into six thematic areas- Political and strategic cooperation; trade and
commerce, investments, agriculture, civil aviation and energy mechanisms;
science, technology and innovation, space cooperation, environment and
technical cooperation, health mechanisms; defence and security mechanisms;
culture and education mechanisms and consular issues, social security and legal
cooperation mechanism.
India and Brazil signed 15 MoUs in
bioenergy cooperation, petroleum and natural gas, investment cooperation and
facilitation, Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (MLAT) in criminal matters, health
and medicine, cultural exchange, social security, ICT, science and technology,
mining, investment promotion, animal husbandry and dairying. Amongst these MoUs,
the treaty of Investment cooperation and facilitation is ground breaking as it
intends to deal with conflicts and disputes between foreign companies and host
country without international arbitration. This will definitely give head start
to economic cooperation. India has evolved new Bilateral Investment Treaty
(BIT). Since 2015 India has scrapped existing treaties with over 83 countries
and signed new BIT with Belarus, Cambodia and Kyrgyzstan.
Given the complementarities and
synergies countries laid foundation for a collaboration between India’s
“National Bio-Fuel Policy” with Brazil’s “Renova” program, a sugarcane-based
ethanol generation program. This joint bioethanol production program can offer
a mutually agreed solution to Brazil’s complaints against India over subsidies
to sugarcane growers. India and Brazil are agrarian countries. Fostering cooperation
in agriculture and food processing, India recently launched Maitri, Agro-tech
cross incubation program where five agriculture startups from both countries would
visit their partner countries to workout innovative policies in agriculture.
Strengthening bilateral cooperation in Animal Husbandry and Dairying, countries
agreed to set up Centre for Excellence in Cattle Genomics at Kalsi,
Uttarakhand. Defence industrial cooperation has been another front, countries
are focusing to promote. A large Brazilian delegation is expected to attend
India Defence Expo in Lucknow, next month.
Brazil, powerhouse of South America
is considered as regional power like India. Both countries which are firmly
unified in their demand for reforms in UNSC and seeking permanent membership
are known to pursue independent foreign policies. Interestingly, both countries
which don’t have historical baggage have mutual respect for each other
diversities. India’s yoga and Ayurveda are popular in Brazil and Indians are
crazy about Brazilian football and samba. With over 20% of their population
below the poverty line, both governments face similar challenges of alleviating
poverty and reducing growing income inequalities. Like India, Brazil is
sceptical of a marauding China and its BRI (Belt and Road Initiative) and
stayed away from joining the connectivity project. Shared concerns about China
can thus be another factor which can bring both countries together. As leaders
of the Third World, India and Brazil have been at the forefront raising issues
concerning developing countries. With global rebalancing underway, regional
powers like India and Brazil which favour a multipolar World must come together
as a bulwark against expansionist powers.
Lending directionality to strategic
partnership, countries signed “Action Plan” to transform this stagnant
relationship by 2023, which marks 75 years of diplomatic ties. Notwithstanding
the negative sceptics over Bolsonaro’s ascendancy and his style of functioning,
Prime Minister gave much need impetus to Indo-Brazilian trade and investment to
realise the full potential that exists between nations.
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