UC Irvine

Chinese companies were singled out among major investors seeking farmland in Brazil, but my own and other emerging research reveals that China still lags far behind investors from the Global North, and there is evidence that the differences between them are far less significant than was presumed. Why then have Chinese agribusinesses been singled out, even as the size and amount of their investments in Brazil–particularly when compared with those form the US, EU, Argentina, and Japan–are in fact relatively small? Who are the actors in Brazil that have contributed to this apparent sinophobia, and who has challenged it? Who benefits? And how have Chinese investments themselves been affected by this disproportionate negative attention? I argue that challenges to national and food sovereignty arise, ultimately, from the transnational soybean production system regardless of the national character of any particular companies or their cross-border relations.