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India and Brazil are doubling down on economic and climate cooperation in a bid to strengthen Brics and bolster the Global South’s negotiating power as both nations face rising trade tensions with the United States. Analysts say the push – announced during Brazilian Vice-President Geraldo Alckmin’s visit to New Delhi last week – is not just about shielding their economies from punitive US tariffs, but also about asserting influence on multilateral issues ranging from energy security to global climate policy. During the visit, the two countries agreed to raise bilateral trade to US$20 billion by 2030 – up from US$12 billion last year – and expand cooperation in sectors spanning automobiles, IT, clean energy and agriculture. The move comes as both countries seek to diversify trade partners after Washington imposed import tariffs of about 50 per cent, among the steepest on any nation in recent years. Speaking at the “India–Brazil Business Dialogue” on Thursday, jointly organised by India’s leading industry bodies and Brazil’s trade promotion agencies, Alckmin described India as a priority partner. Indian Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal echoed the sentiment, saying both countries enjoyed a long-standing and trusted relationship built on “shared values and complementary strengths”. “This is a partnership of weight and complementarity. There is a reason to be together because their interests coincide, but it is also in the interest of humankind,” Manjeev Puri, India’s former ambassador to the European Union, told This Week in Asia. Both countries were strong advocates for protecting the interests of developing nations in the Global South, he said. Brazil has helped the Global South by raising issues such as food security and health at multilateral forums including Brics and G20, while India has provided digital infrastructure sharing, humanitarian aid and supported the inclusion of the African Union into the G20. Besides being founding members of Brics – a bloc of major emerging national economies that includes Russia, China and South Africa – India and Brazil are also part of a trilateral grouping called the India-Brazil-South Africa Dialogue Forum that seeks to promote cooperation in various sectors. “It is in our national interest that we be with Brazil and we will be with Brazil, no matter that there are strong headwinds from the US in particular,” Puri said. Despite the physical distance between the two countries, Brazil remains India’s largest trade partner in South America. Experts say there are several possible areas for deeper bilateral cooperation. Brazil’s pioneering efforts in developing sugar cane-based biofuels could be important for India’s own efforts to increase use of ethanol to trim crude oil imports, which had historically been the biggest drag on its foreign exchange, Puri noted. Aviation could be another sector, experts say. Brazilian aerospace major Embraer inaugurated its office in Delhi on Friday to strengthen its presence in India’s commercial aviation. The Indian Air Force and commercial airline Star Air already use Embraer aircraft. Observers are also hoping that the cooperation between the two countries would help advance the goals for limiting global warming at the UN climate summit next month in Brazil, even as the US has vacated its leadership by withdrawing from the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement. “Clean energy and green manufacturing for China, Brazil and India is no longer just about climate but has increasingly become central to national economic, diplomatic and security strategies,” said Tim Sahay, co-director of the Net Zero Industrial Policy Lab at Johns Hopkins University. With nearly 90 per cent of its power sourced from renewables, Brazil had enormous green potential that was being activated by the country’s green industrial policy, Sahay said, noting that there had been a surge of foreign direct investment in its renewable energy sector. India, for its part, reached its goal of sourcing 50 per cent of its installed electricity capacity from non-fossil fuel sources in July, five years ahead of its 2030 deadline. There were strong complementarities between the two countries on green energy and renewables, said Uday Chandra, an assistant professor at Georgetown University in Qatar. “Brazil’s biofuel base and hydrogen ambitions mesh with India’s large-scale solar/renewable manufacturing and green-hydrogen push,” he said, adding that existing pacts and joint agenda from international forums already pointed to bilateral cooperation. Chandra noted that Brics was likely to be strengthened politically and economically in the short to medium run, as tariff pressure incentivised deeper coordination within the bloc. “Nonetheless, actual outcomes will depend on divergent national interests and the heterogeneity of Brics members, including their respective ties to the US economy,” he said. While there were vested interests for Brazil and India to advance cooperation, Puri said it was good news for other countries, especially those in the Global South. “We are both countries which stand strongly committed to multilateralism. Their vested interest coincides with that of the Global South,” he said.
