Alessandro Parodi and Victoria Waldersee
Updated 6 min read
(Reuters) -The world's largest car-carrying ship - with the equivalent of 20 football fields of vehicles - completed its maiden journey late last month to dock in Brazil's Itajai port.
But not everyone is cheering its arrival.
BYD (BYDDF, 1211.HK), China's top producer of electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles, is offering Brazilian car shoppers relatively low-priced options in a market where the green-car movement is still in its infancy. Brazilian auto-industry officials and labor leaders worry that the vast influx of cars from BYD and other Chinese automakers will set back domestic auto production and hurt jobs.
BYD has deployed a growing fleet of cargo ships to accelerate its expansion overseas, with Brazil becoming its top target, according to Reuters analysis of shipping data and company statements. The late-May shipment was the fourth of the Chinese carmaker’s ships to dock in Brazil this year, totaling around 22,000 vehicles, according to Reuters calculations.
BYD, the world’s top producer of electric and plug-in hybrid cars, is the largest among several Chinese brands targeting Brazil for growth. China-built vehicle imports are expected to grow nearly 40% this year, to about 200,000, according to Brazil’s main auto association. That would account for roughly 8% of total light-vehicle registrations.
Industry and labor groups say China is taking advantage of Brazil's temporarily low tariff barriers to ramp up its exports rather than investing to build Brazilian factories and create jobs. They are lobbying Brazil's government to accelerate by a year a plan to increase Brazil's tariff on all EV imports to 35% from 10%, rather than gradually phasing in higher levies.
"Countries around the world started closing their doors to the Chinese, but Brazil didn't," said Aroaldo da Silva, a Mercedes-Benz production worker and president of IndustriALL Brasil, a confederation of unions across six industrial sectors. "China made use of that."
BYD did not respond to a request for comment on the industry’s concerns.
Brazil has emerged as a flashpoint in the China auto industry's torrid global expansion. A growing surplus of new cars being pumped out of Chinese factories has led to an export boom over the past five years, helping China pass Japan in 2023 to become the world’s top vehicle exporter. Much of this excess is being shipped overseas, to markets like Europe, Southeast Asia and Latin America.
Brazil offers an enticing destination due to its large market - it is the sixth-largest car market by volume - where established players including Volkswagen (VOW3.DE, VWAGY), General Motors (GM) and Jeep-maker Stellantis (STLA) have been building cars domestically for decades. The Brazilian government has set policies aimed at growing sales of electric and plug-in hybrid cars, BYD’s specialty.
