Bolivian President Luis Arce speaking at a high-level meeting in Venezuela, April 20, 2023. Photo: Reuters/Leonardo Fernández Viloria.
Bolivia is considering “not transacting” in US dollars and instead using the Chinese national currency, the yuan, to carry out its international transactions with China, joining Brazil and Argentina in the de-dollarization trend.
The president of Bolivia, Luis Arce, stated in a press conference on Wednesday, May 10, that Bolivia is considering shifting to yuan in its bilateral trade with China, given that Argentina and Brazil, the two largest economies in the region, are already trading in yuan in their commercial activities with China.
Arce said that although the Latin American region has traditionally been under US influence, recently many countries have reported higher volumes of foreign trade with China than with the United States.
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“The trend in the region is going to continue like that,” Arce said, and added that Bolivia cannot “remain on the sidelines of what is happening.”
“Why should we worry about the dollar if in reality, the majority of trade here consists of imports from China?” he said.
In April of this year, the government of Argentina announced a currency swap deal with China, through which it will pay in yuan for its imports from the Asian giant.
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In the same month, the presidents of China and Brazil, Xi Jinping and Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, respectively, announced in a joint declaration signed during their meeting in Beijing their willingness to carry out bilateral commercial transactions in yuan, “without the need for dollarization.”
China is the main trading partner of a number of Latin American countries such as Brazil, Chile, and Peru. In reaction to this trend, the United States has been accusing Beijing of manipulating the exchange rate.
(HispanTV)
Translation: Orinoco Tribune
OT/SC/KZ
