The Chinese will build an electric factory in Brazil. “We will strengthen our relations”

On Thursday, Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva solemnly inaugurated in his country, which is the world's sixth car market, the construction of the first large electric car factory in Latin America, which is undertaken by the Chinese automotive company BYD.

“We will strengthen our relations with China, our country's largest trading partner for fifteen years,” declared President Lula during the ceremony, during which he emphasized the relations of friendship between him and Chinese leader Xi Jinping.

“We treat each other as two important countries in the global south,” said the Brazilian president.

He also emphasized that Brazil “wants to maintain the same relations with the rest of the world” and mentioned “the United States of Donald Trump.”

The plant, the construction of which was officially inaugurated on Thursday in the city of Camacari in the state of Bahia, in the north-east of Brazil, will represent an investment of 5.5 billion reais (nearly 1 billion dollars).

In the first year after launch, they are to produce 150,000 electric and hybrid cars, and in 2027, in addition to passenger cars, trucks and buses will also start rolling off the factory's production lines.

Electric cars – the vast majority of them made in China – have already accounted for 10 percent of all cars sold in Brazil this year. (PAP)

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