National flags of China and Brazil fly outside the Forbidden City for the President of Brazil Jair Bolsonaro's first official visit to China in Beijing on Thursday. Photo: IC

Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro's first state visit to China aims to seek pragmatic cooperation to boost diplomatic and economic relations, a move that Chinese analysts said marks a stark reversal of his earlier tough stance toward Beijing and underscores the shared interests of the two emerging giants.

During the three-day trip starting from Thursday, Bolsonaro will meet President Xi Jinping and other Chinese officials and witness the signing of business agreements covering agricultural, infrastructure, technology and other sectors, according to officials.

Following meetings in Beijing, Xi and Bolsonaro will also meet early November in Brazil during the BRICS summit. Other items on the agenda for the Brazilian president's visit include discussions about the cooperation between the five-country BRICS bloc and the China-proposed Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), according to media reports.

Bolsonaro's visit comes as the Brazilian economy, which is expected to grow by less than 1 percent in 2019, struggles to recover from a recession and as the US continues to pressure countries around the world, including Brazil, to adopt its hostile approach toward Beijing.

"In wake of tremendous global uncertainty, everyone must be pragmatic and Bolsonaro has realized that he needs to take a balanced position between China and the US," Wu Baiyi, an expert on Latin America at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in Beijing, told the Global Times Thursday. 

During his election campaign, Bolsonaro criticized Chinese investments in Brazil and openly expressed admiration for US President Donald Trump, leading some to fear that Bolsonaro could adopt Washington's hostile approach to China. 

But since he took office earlier this year, the Brazilian president has toned down his rhetoric.

 "Despite his earlier tough talk, he knows that China cannot be replaced, not even by the US, in terms of trade and investment in Brazil," said Zhou Zhiwei, executive director of the Brazil research center at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in Beijing.

China is Brazil's largest trading partner and the largest source of investment, Zhou noted.

In 2018, bilateral trade between China and Brazil reached a record $100 billion and Chinese investment in Brazil totaled nearly $80 billion, according to official data. 

Cooperation in the agricultural sector has become a highlight of the bilateral trade ties between the two countries and the two sides should sign an action plan for further cooperation in the area, Chinese Minister of Agriculture and Rural Affairs Han Changbin told his Brazilian counterpart during a meeting on Thursday, according to the ministry.

Han proposed to hold a meeting for agricultural next year in China and continue to promote Chinese crop seeds in Brazil, the ministry said in a statement. 

Brazil has also emerged as a beneficiary in the China-US trade war, as China has increased imports of agricultural goods, particularly soybeans, from Brazil, which became an ideal alternative source of agricultural goods for China as it diversifies its import channels to reduce reliance on US farm goods.

Even as China resumed imports of US soybeans as trade talks made progress, it continues to buy Brazilian soybeans, which are generally cheaper than those from the US. In the week after the latest round of trade talks, China purchased $173 million worth of Brazilian soybeans, Reuters reported on Tuesday. 

Apart from further expanding its commodity trade, Brazil is also seeking to participate in the BRI's massive infrastructure and trade programs, said Wang Youming, director of the institute of developing countries at the China Institute of International Studies in Beijing, who follows developments in Brazil closely.

"Many Brazilian scholars describe the BRI as the largest opening of the Chinese economy since China's accession to the WTO and [Bolsonaro's] advisors are advocating Brazil participate in the BRI," Wang told the Global Times on Thursday.

Bai Yunyi contributed to this story