China investing heavily in Brazil and South America...

Blades slicing through the morning heat, the helicopter rose from the tarmac and swept into a cobalt sky, high above Rio's Guanabara Bay.

It powered north-east over deserted beaches, dense Atlantic rainforest and fishing boats that bobbed lazily in the ocean below. Then finally, 80 minutes on, the destination came into view: a gigantic concrete pier that juts nearly two miles out into the South Atlantic and boasts an unusual nickname: the Highway to China.

(...)

The surge in China's South American spending is not just a Brazilian phenomenon. Ecuador has already signed around $5bn of bilateral deals with China this year, including $1.7bn to help build a hydro-electric dam and $1bn investments for oil exploration and infrastructure projects. That compared with Chinese investment of just $56m in 2009.

Chinese companies have sunk $1.4bn into mining operations in Peru this year, while in April Hugo Chávez announced that the Chinese, already major sponsors of Venezuelan oil exploration, had agreed to open a $20bn credit-line for the "Bolivarian revolution". Full story...

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