57
RED
WAVE
Under Chinese
President Xi Jinping,
three Latin American
nations have switched
diplomatic ties from
Taipei to Beijing
ARGENTINA
U.S.
BELIZE
BOLIVIA
BRAZIL
CHILE
COLOMBIA
GUATEMALA
COSTA RICA
CUBA
ECUADOR
HAITI
ST. VINCENT AND
THE GRENADINES
ST. KITTS AND NEVIS
ST. LUCIA
HONDURAS
MEXICO JAMAICAJAMAICAJAMAICA
NICARAGUA
PARAGUAY
PERU
URUGUAY
VENEZUELA
FORMAL RELATIONS
WITH THE REPUBLIC
OF CHINA (TAIWAN)
FORMAL RELATIONS
WITH THE PEOPLE’S
REPUBLIC OF CHINA
CHINA
TAIWAN
U.S.
AREA DETAILED
EL SALVADOR
SWITCHED IN
AUGUST 2018
PANAMA
SWITCHED IN
JUNE 2017
DOMINICAN
REPUBLIC
SWITCHED IN
MAY 2018
“Infrastructure development has shrunk
the distance between Asia and Latin
America,” AIIB president Jin Liqun tells
TIME in his Beijing headquarters.
That said, plenty of Chinese-backed
infrastructure projects have left host
countries with regrets. In Costa Rica,
a $1.5 billion project to modernize and
expand an oil refi nery in Moín was can-
celed in 2016 after local offi cials high-
lighted that environmental- impact and
feasibility studies had been performed
by a subsidiary of the Chinese partner, a
clear confl ict of interest that led to sev-
eral arrests. In Ecuador, a hydroelectric
dam built by China’s Sinohydro Corp.,
with help from a $1.7 billion loan from
China’s Export- Import Bank, turned
into an environmental disaster after it
opened in 2016 as upstream erosion
from the dam’s basin contributed to oil
spills from shifting pipelines. Most of
the Ecuadorean offi cials involved in the
project have been convicted of bribery,
including a former Vice President, a for-
mer Electricity Minister and even a for-
mer anticorruption offi cial.
But China’s clout in renewable energy
has mostly won it advantages. “No coun-
try has put itself in a better position to
become the world’s renewable energy su-
perpower than China,” says a recent re-
port by the Global Commission on the
Geopolitics of Energy Transformation,
chaired by former Iceland President Ola-
fur Grimsson. In Brazil, China’s State Grid
Corp. is the largest power- generation
and -distribution company, while China
Three Gorges (CTG), the world’s larg-
est hydropower provider, controls 17 out
of a total of 48 hydro plants as well as 11
wind farms. “This is a country that has
200 million people, but energy consump-
tion per person is still very small,” says
CTG Brazil CEO Li Yinsheng. “So we see
huge potential in terms of demand.”
The U.S. is not taking this lying down.
In 2018, it launched its América Crece ini-
tiative as a direct competitor to Belt and
Road. It helps countries attract private
investment by establishing transparent
rules according to international best prac-
tices. In January, the U.S. International
Development Finance Corp. unveiled a
$1 billion injection into Guatemala’s pri-
vate sector to spur investment and create
jobs, with the aim of catalyzing an addi-
tional $4 billion in
private investment.
In September 2019,
Ivanka Trump trav-
eled to Paraguay to
launch a trilateral
commitment under
the U.S. Overseas
Private Investment
Corp. —now the
U.S. International
Development Fi-
nance Corp.—that
doubles an exist-
ing $500 million
pledge of support
for women and
small and medium-
size enterprises
(SMEs), includ-
ing a $138 million
commitment from
Taiwan.
To be sure, the U.S. also has over a cen-
tury of trade, aid and investment to fall
back on. Latin America has historically
been the part of the world with the high-
est approval rating for the U.S., rooted in
foreign assistance, law-enforcement co-
operation, education and cultural ties.
In 2019, China’s trade with the western
hemisphere stood at $330 billion, with
FDI stock at $180 billion. The U.S.’s was
$1.9 trillion and $250 billion, respectively.
But perception is reality, and plenty
were skeptical of the previous White
House’s outreach in the last two years of
Trump’s term. “The only way the Trump
Administration saw Latin America is
179 BILLION
The number of
masks China has
provided in aid to
over 150 countries
during the COVID-
19 pandemic
100 MILLION
The number of
doses of China’s
Sinovac COVID-
19 vaccine Brazil’s
government has
agreed to buy
