Argentina-China: new courses for an old dependency
Rubén Laufer
Rubén Laufer
ABSTRACT
Historically, the
subordinate association of powerful sectors of the Argentine ruling classes
—with a usually direct presence in, or strong ties with, the State apparatus—
with the financial capital of great powers, has been at the base of the
Argentine dependency. This was also the case in the late nineteenth century and
during the first third of the twentieth century, when powerful Argentine
exporting-landowners and business sectors held a so-called “special” or
“privileged” relation with British capitalism.
Today, as then, representatives of governmental and
economic spheres of China and
Argentina, both public and private, emphasize the complementary nature of Argentina's economy – as well as other
countries’ in the region-- in relation to the industrial economy of the Asian
power. Commercial ties and direct investment or association of Chinese capital
within local economies are described as an opportunity
that would allow Latin American countries to develop their production,
diversify their International Relations and reduce their external debts. With
these considerations, in the Argentine case, government and business sectors
—some of them directly related to Chinese interests, promote the adaptation of strategic areas of the
local economy to the complementarity
with the Chinese economy.
During the last
decade, bilateral trade structures and public and private Chinese investments
in Argentina further consolidated the historic division of labor among the
great powers and Latin American countries, strengthening the primary-export
profile of National production reflected, among other aspects, in the marked
process of specialization in soy production and exports and concentration that
characterizes agricultural production and exports in Argentina.
While some sectors of the ruling classes promote this renewed insertion of Argentina into the world economy —now in relation to
China, some others warn against the reconstitution of an “export
model similar to that of the XIXth
century” —and they even point the outlining of a “new
neo-colonial connection with China as a metropolis”; instead, they intend to
complement the specialization of Argentina in exportable primary products with
some industrial diversification, attracting Chinese investment into industrial
or infrastructural branches, complementary or merely subsidiary to the
strategic needs of Beijing. This strategy converges with neo-developmentalist
approaches rooted today in many governments of Latin America.
So, the growing
importance of bilateral trade and of Chinese capital in Argentina and its
competition with American and European interests with historic roots in the
country, require us to
rethink the “classic” debate about Argentina and most
Latin American countries’ dependency upon great powers.
RESUMEN
Las relaciones económicas y políticas entre la
Argentina y China experimentaron una rápida expansión desde hace una década y
media, y especialmente a partir de 2004 cuando el gobierno del entonces
presidente Néstor Kirchner definió el rumbo de “asociación estratégica” con la
potencia oriental. Ello tuvo su correlato en la conformación y desarrollo de
importantes grupos terratenientes y empresariales asociados a intereses
estatales o privados de China. Este proceso tuvo lugar también en el rubro
energético: en los últimos años, en forma individual o en asociación con
empresas locales, corporaciones chinas avanzaron en la adquisición o control de
algunas de las más importantes empresas petroleras y mineras nacionales o
extranjeras de la Argentina.
Históricamente, la asociación subordinada de
poderosos sectores de las clases dirigentes argentinas —habitualmente con
presencia directa o fuertes vínculos con el aparato estatal— al capital
financiero de las grandes potencias, estuvo y está en la base de la dependencia
argentina. Así ocurrió a fines del siglo XIX y durante el primer tercio del
siglo XX, cuando los terratenientes exportadores y poderosos sectores
empresariales argentinos sostuvieron una así llamada “relación especial” o
“privilegiada” con el capitalismo británico.
En la actualidad, al igual que entonces,
representantes de ámbitos gubernamentales y económicos chinos y argentinos,
tanto públicos como privados, destacan el carácter complementario de la economía argentina —y de otros países de la
región— con la economía industrial de la potencia asiática. Los lazos
comerciales y la radicación o asociación de capitales de China en las economías
locales son descriptos como una oportunidad
que permitiría a nuestros países desarrollar sus producciones, diversificar sus
relaciones internacionales y disminuir su endeudamiento externo. Con estas
consideraciones, en el caso de la Argentina, sectores gubernamentales y
empresariales —algunos de ellos directamente asociados a intereses chinos—
promueven la adaptación de áreas estratégicas
de la economía local a la complementación
con China.
Durante la última década, las estructuras del
intercambio bilateral y de las inversiones oficiales y privadas de China en la
Argentina consolidaron la histórica división internacional del trabajo entre
las grandes potencias y los países latinoamericanos, reforzando el perfil
primario-exportador de la producción nacional reflejado, entre otras cosas, en
el pronunciado proceso de “sojización” y concentración que caracteriza a la
producción agraria y las exportaciones argentinas.
Mientras algunos sectores de las clases
dirigentes promueven esta reedición de la antigua inserción argentina en la
economía mundial —ahora en relación con China—, otros denuncian la
reconstitución de un “modelo exportador similar al del siglo XIX” —e incluso el
esbozo de “una nueva relación neocolonial con China como metrópolis”—, y en su
lugar proponen complementar
la especialización argentina en productos primarios exportables con alguna
diversificación industrial, atrayendo inversiones chinas hacia ramas industriales y de
infraestructura complementarias —o simplemente subsidiarias— de las necesidades
estratégicas de Beijing. Esta estrategia converge
con los enfoques neodesarrollistas hoy arraigados en muchos gobiernos de
América Latina.
El creciente peso del comercio bilateral y del
capital chino en la Argentina y su competencia con intereses estadounidenses y
europeos de antiguo arraigo en el país replantean, así, el “clásico” debate
acerca de la dependencia argentina —y de la mayor parte de los países
latinoamericanos— respecto de las grandes potencias.
For several
years China has been one of Argentina’s main trade partners. Sales of soybeans
and soybean products to the eastern power are the backbone of exports, foreign
exchange earnings and fiscal resources of the country. At the same time, just
as in other Latin American countries, the Argentine domestic market has seen a
veritable flood of goods of Chinese industry. In correspondence with the
intensification of trade, a strong flow of Chinese investment was originated,
oriented to extractive industries (oil and mining), infrastructure linked to
exports to the Asian country (railways, harbors), finance (banking, financing of projects associated with Chinese capital) and domestic trade (Chinese supermarkets).
Moreover, recently investments have developed aimed at controlling —not
necessarily by buying—large peaces of public land for food production, entirely
for sale to China.
The
intensification of bilateral relations should be framed within the Latin
American context. Brazil, Mexico, Chile and Venezuela —in addition to Argentina
itself— established “strategic partnerships” with the Asian power in recent
years. Chile, Peru and Costa Rica signed with China widespread free trade
agreements. Moreover, during Chinese Vice President Wen Jiabao’s recent tour
through several Latin American countries, he proposed the creation of a
"Cooperation Forum", another agricultural forum, and even a free
trade area between the East and Latin America as a whole (Doudchitzky, Y., 2012, June 28; Urgente24, 2012, June 28).
To the rhythm of the rapid
expansion of commercial interests, industrialists and financiers of China in
Argentina have been consolidating their economic and political links with
sections of the ruling classes of the country. The mode of international
integration of Argentina is undergoing profound changes with the emergence of
significant fractions of those classes that are linked to state and private
economic groups of the Asian power. This refers particularly to the great
landowners and the entrepreneurs linked to the foreign capital.
Argentina and Latin America in the strategic map
of China
Top Chinese
officials set the policy of investing Chinese trade surplus in strategic
sectors of countries with abundant natural resources (De la Siega V., 2010;
Malena, J., 2011). Backed by the China Investment Corporation (CIC, a sovereign
fund of 300 billion dollars), Chinese corporations bought foreign companies in
order to establish partnerships to ensure the provision of those resources.
According to a report of the Economic Commission for Latin America (ECLAC),
Chinese direct investment in the region grew exponentially in 2010, surpassing
15 billion dollars, more than double the amount invested in the two decades
from 1990 to 2009; in Argentina, investments totaled 143 million in the period
1990-2009 and they grew up to 5.55 billion in 2010. Furthermore, large state
and private corporations of China positioned, directly or in partnership with
local groups, in key economic areas of the economies of the region: oil, gas,
hydroelectric dams, communications, mining of iron, copper, gold, lithium;
manufacture of cars and trucks, banks, loans to pay in oil, large
infrastructure projects —roads, railways, ports—, internal and external trade,
and so (CEPAL, 2010; CEPAL, June 2011). No doubt Latin America, as the South
Pacific and Africa, has come to occupy a critical place in the strategies of
economic expansion and political influence of China in the world.
In Argentina,
together with the rapid growth of bilateral trade and Chinese investment, local
business groups have been established and are expanding since the 1990s. These
groups became commercial intermediaries of the Beijing government, or
subordinate managers or partners of Chinese private or public corporations in
large investment projects in the South American country and others in the
region. Some of these local groups are of domestic origin, which had previous
ties with European interests --Russian or others--, and their members tend to
have direct representation or strong influence at the National or provincial
levels. Many of them operate through the Argentina-China Chamber of Production,
Industry and Trade, which brings together some of the largest land and business
trusts of the country, local and foreign (Spadone, Werthein, Macri, Blaquier,
Loeb, etc.). Other groups (Roggio, Elsztain) do not integrate the Chamber but
maintain equally important links and partnerships with Chinese interests. Not
only businesses expanded, diplomatic and political contacts also multiplied.
The
increasing presence of China's interests in the region competes with the
traditional influence of economic, political and strategic interests of the
United States and European powers in Latin America (Dumbaugh K. and Sullivan M.
P., 2005; Logan S. and Bain B., 2005). The struggle for obtaining businesses and
privileged conditions —directly or through such partnerships—, and seeking for
influence or control over basic levels of economic and State structures (a
nucleus element of what is commonly known as dependency) condition the
evolution of Latin American countries.
Lately, the
world experienced a notorious shifting of economic growth and international
political relations to the East and in particular to China. This fact, together
with the global economic crisis that erupted in 2008 in the United States and
Europe --which currently entered in a dramatic course with the deep financial,
debt and fiscal crisis, and harsh adjustment policies and intense social
mobilization in the European Union and the American superpower-- give a
first-order importance to the economic, political and strategic role of China
as a world power.
For these
reasons, the nature of the Chinese links with Argentina —and with other
countries of the Third World, is the subject of intense controversy both in
academia and in spaces of political debate, strategic decision-making and
foreign policy. At least three crucial, closely interlinked aspects are under
discussion: 1) the nature of the social and political system of China as well
as the economic and strategic interests of the Chinese state and Chinese
National and private corporations 2) the nature of relations that Latin
American countries and powerful sections of the ruling classes have been
establishing with the Eastern power, and 3) the implications that this kind of
relation has for the Latin American region and countries’ economic development
and international position.
Understanding how these relations are conceived
derive different assessments of the strategic
partnerships that Latin American countries with very different political
regimes are establishing with China. These represent contentious, necessary and
urgent issues, given the inevitable impact that the ongoing international
economic crisis and heightened competition among the major world powers have
and will have on the fate of Latin America in the present and immediate future.
This article
examines the relations the eastern power is establishing with powerful sectors
of the ruling classes in Argentina. These relations are a multifaceted
phenomenon: the energy issue is important, but it is a particular part of a
wide frame of aspects ranging from economic to political, cultural and
military. Taken together those aspects reflect the contents of the strategic partnership between the two
countries, as it has been taking shape over a decade. Although the historical
background that will be mentioned below, and the allusion to political and
economic, local or intermediary groups associated with Chinese interests are
limited to the Argentine case, its general features and many of its
implications could be drawn, omitting the specificities of each case, to
dependent countries in general and to many countries of Latin America in
particular.
Argentina-China: bilateral trade,
complementarities and structural adaptation
Soybean is today the most
important crop in Argentina: it occupies over 64% of the planted area in the
country (Teubal, M., 2006). The growth of soybean production over the last
decade and a half, both in volume and planted area, has been exponential, as
shown on Table 1.
Table 1.
Argentina—Transgenic Soybean Production (volume and area planted)
|
||
|
Area (hectares)
|
Volume (tons)
|
1997
|
6.000.000
|
11.000.000
|
2007
|
16.600.000
|
47.000.000
|
2010
|
19.000.000
|
56.000.000
|
Source. Donovan, 2011.
Argentina has become the leading exporter of
soybean meal and soybean oil. Argentine exports of soybean meal basically for
livestock consumption represent, in value, 45% of the world production, and
those of soybean oil 60%. In addition, production and export of biodiesel
produced from soybean oil, increase year to year. The area planted with this
oilseed in the campaign 2011/2012 amounts to nearly 19 million hectares[1], similar to the cycle
2010/11, with an estimated production of 50 million tons. Considering
relatively lower yields due to the current drought, the export of soybeans
would reach about 9 million tons, and soybeans processed into flour, oil and
biodiesel, about 38.5 million tons. In Argentina, exports of soybeans and
soybean products are charged 35% of their value in the form of export duties;
these revenues represent more than half the export duty and 5% of total revenue
of the national state (Donovan, 2011 September 4). In value, and at prices
prevailing as of January 2012, this would mean an income of 23,000 million just
for the exports of the soybean complex, and delivering 8,000 million dollars in
deductions to the Treasury (Alvarado
Ledesma, M. (2011, November 21) [2]. These figures are useful in
order to illustrate the heavy reliance of the trade balance and fiscal revenues
of Argentina on this item.
In 2010 Argentina was the
fourth largest trading partner of China in Latin America bilateral trade
(imports plus exports) was around 13,000 million dollars. At the same time,
China became the second largest trading partner of Argentina in both imports
and exports, in both cases after Brazil and before the United States. The value
of Argentine exports to China was 5,796 million dollars, while imports totaled
7,649 million dollars. The bilateral trade balance, until 2008, showed a
surplus for Argentina as a result of the new global cycle boom of commodity
exports, denoted a trade deficit for that year, and in 2010 showed a deficit of
1,853 million dollars (Agricultural Department of the Embassy of Argentina in the PRC, 2011, May
10), and in the first half of 2011 the deficit had
already exceeded the entire previous year (Premici, S., 2011, July 21) mainly for industrial imports, as the agricultural balance remains strongly
positive (MercadoContinuo.com, 2011,
February 28) (see Table 2).
As for the composition of
bilateral trade, it continues to show a marked asymmetry: manufactured goods
and agricultural commodities are over 80% of Argentine exports to China, while
98.8% of the Chinese goods imported by Argentina are industrial manufactures
(machinery, textiles, plastics, footwear). In 2010 the main items of imports of
Argentina from China were computers and radio and television parts, video
monitors and video projectors, glyphosate (herbicide), motorcycles, cell
phones, machine parts, etc. Table 2 and Figures 1 and 2 show the enormous
weight of the agribusiness products in Argentine exports to China.
TABLE 2: Argentina–China,
Bilateral Trade 2005–2010: Total Trade and Agro-industrial Trade
|
||||||||
|
||||||||
Período
|
Total
Trade
|
Agro-industrial Trade
|
Agro/Total
|
Agro/Total
|
||||
(million dollars)
|
(million dollars)
|
(%)
|
(%)
|
|||||
Year
|
Export.
|
Import.
|
Total Trade
|
Export.
|
Import.
|
Agro Bal.Com.
|
% Export.
|
% Import.
|
Balance
|
Ba. Com.
|
|||||||
2005
|
3.192,65
|
2.236,83
|
955,82
|
2.661,44
|
12,63
|
2.648,80
|
83,36%
|
0,56%
|
2006
|
3.475,85
|
3.121,70
|
354,15
|
2.376,01
|
19,39
|
2.356,62
|
68,36%
|
0,62%
|
2007
|
5.169,82
|
5.092,95
|
76,87
|
4.576,09
|
31,46
|
4.544,63
|
88,52%
|
0,62%
|
2008
|
6.354,96
|
7.103,89
|
-748,93
|
5.474,14
|
42,02
|
5.432,11
|
86,14%
|
0,59%
|
2009
|
3.668,28
|
4.822,60
|
-1.154,31
|
3.193,28
|
32,53
|
3.160,75
|
87,05%
|
0,67%
|
2010
|
5.794,49
|
7.648,85
|
-1.854,36
|
4.965,29
|
51,25
|
4.914,04
|
85,69%
|
0,67%
|
Source. Based on data from Argentina. Presidencia de la Nación. Ministerio
de Agricultura, Ganadería y Pesca, based on data of the Instituto Nacional de Estadísticas
y Censos (INDEC) (2011).
Figure 1 Figure
2
Argentina-China, bilateral trade 2005-2010 Argentina-China, bilateral trade
2005-2010
(total trade) (agro-industrial
trade)
Source: Own elaboration based on
data from: Argentina. Presidencia de la Nación.
Ministerio de Agricultura, Ganadería y Pesca,; based on data of the
Instituto Nacional de Estadísticas y Censos (INDEC) (2011, March).
Brazil exports over 30% of soy
complex products to China, whereas Argentina exports toward this kind of
products is much more pronounced (73%), which constitutes a dependence on
soybean exports and even a Chinese dependence, provoked basically by landowners
and export companies, and the Argentine ruling class in general. the
Inter-American Development Bank estimated “in 2002, soybean accounted for 25%
of Argentine exports, mainly to China and other countries in Asia. Argentina
has become highly dependent on the Chinese soybean market, which is not exactly
stable”(Cornejo, R., 2005, October 12-13).
In fact, exportation of
soybeans and soybean products has become a symbol of both the potential and the
external vulnerability of Argentina: in December 2011, the demand and prices of
these products were not so dependent on domestic needs as of the evolution of
the economic crisis in Europe, the reduction in planted area and United States
exports, and the potential impact that the brake of the two economies could
have on China's development (Colombres, M., 2011, December 9).
Néstor Kirchner as president
of Argentina travelled to Beijing in November 2004, where he signed a
Memorandum of Understanding on cooperation in trade and investment between
Argentina and the PRC. According to the document, in five years the annual
value of Argentine exports would increase by 4 billion dollars over the current
level. But, as the volumes exported to the PRC are concentrated in the soybean
complex, this clause would only reaffirm the primary-export profile of
Argentina (Oviedo E.,
2006). The so-called “production
model” in place since 2003, based on a high exchange rate, while allowed some
recovery in industrial local activity
—not necessarily national, also
strengthened the great agrarian business, making it strategic as main provider
of foreign exchange; at the same time, the large devaluation operated in 2002
and the accelerated inflation depreciated business costs.
The process of “selective
deindustrialization” and re-primarization of the economy —as at the time ECLAC
called the Latin America return to the agro-mining specialization for export,
feature of colonial and post-colonial period, now stimulated by the “strategic
partnership” with China, is not unique to Argentina. The same sliding into
“agrarianization” and “mineralization” of production affects many other “Third
World” countries like Mexico and the China's allies of the BRICS group as
Brazil and South Africa (Dussel
Peters, E., 2009).
Specifying the above, in 2010 some soy complex products (beans and soybean oil) accounted for 89.6% of Argentine agricultural exports to China, as shown on Table 3. Argentina
already is, in addition, the second largest producer of biodiesel, made from soybean oil (Genoud, D., 2011, September 29).
Table 3. Chinese Imports of Agricultural Products from Argentina, 2008–2010
(million dollars and percent of total)
|
|||||||
Rank 2010
|
Description
|
2008
|
2009
|
2010
|
|||
|
|
Value
|
Share
%
|
Value
|
Share
%
|
Value
|
Share
%
|
|
Total Chinese
agricultural
imports from Argentina
|
8.425
|
|
3.487,9
|
|
5.705,6
|
|
1
|
Soybean
|
5.803,5
|
68,9
|
1.650,3
|
47,3
|
4.977,8
|
87,2
|
2
|
2 Frozen chicken claw
|
204,6
|
2,4
|
73,7
|
2,1
|
170,0
|
3,0
|
3
|
3 Crude soybean oil
|
2.205,0
|
26,2
|
1.408,3
|
40,4
|
136,2
|
2,4
|
4
|
4 Crude sunflower oil
|
4,3
|
--
|
111,7
|
3,2
|
98,0
|
1,7
|
Source. Based on Agricultural
Department of the Embassy of Argentina in the PRC (2011).
The expansion of Genetically
Modified (GM) soy stressed also the landowner nature of land tenure and use.
“Sowing pools” in the hands of powerful National and International consortia
increased their effective control of large fertile areas, with the consequent
expulsion of farmers from direct production and increasing depopulation of the
countryside. The steep increase in land prices due to demand for land for
oilseed (the value of a hectare in the Pampas almost quadrupled in the last
decade) contributed to the process of expulsion-concentration. Furthermore,
also in part under the influence of soybean expansion, 17 million hectares
across the country were in foreign hands already in 2001 (INDEC, Censo Nacional Agropecuario, 2001).
At the concentration of land
ownership and agricultural production adds that of the merchandising of the
production of soy and its derivatives, which is controlled by a small core of
companies. And as happened a century ago
with Argentine meat exports, foreign sales are concentrated in a handful of
large foreign corporations. In 1998-2010 the share of the top five export
consortia leapt from 33% to 84 % of total sales. In the case of grain exports, in the same period the
share of business controlled by the five major exporters increased from 51% to
70%. And the foreign ownership also deepened: while in 1988 there were
cooperative entities and national owned firms (Federación Argentina de Cooperativas Agrarias,
Agricultores Federados Argentinos), in 2010
the dome was composed entirely of exporting foreign monopolies (Cargill,
Toepfer, Bunge, Argentina ADM and Dreyfus) (Ortiz, R. and Pérez, P., 2011, May).
Chinese investment in strategic economic areas
The strong flow of investment
from State and private companies from China to Argentina, which took place in
less than a decade, is the correlation, as we have seen, of an equally strong
intensification of the exchange. Chinese investment in Argentina has been
directed, as in most countries of the region, to areas of production and
services directly related to exports to China, including railways, oil, iron
and soybeans.
The Chinese capital inflow in
Argentina shows similar characteristics to those originating in other major
powers over the country's contemporary history. The representatives of private
or state capital of the Asian power systematically used the tremendous
importance of the Chinese market to establish permanent links with sectors of
local landowners and capitalists and government officials at National,
provincial and municipal levels and to get —through these links, conditions of
privilege (tax breaks, land grants, government investments in complementary
works necessary for foreign undertaking, etc.). Under these benefits, a
significant portion of the funds that are nominally shown as foreign
investment, are in fact financed with internal resources.
Similar to other countries in
Latin America, Africa and Asia, the Chinese investor interest in Argentina is
directly linked to the needs of its industrial and commercial rapid expansion,
and is primarily intended to extractive branches (oil and mining),
infrastructure linked to exports toward the Asian country (railways, harbors),
the financial area (banking, financing of projects related to Chinese
capitals), domestic trade and other areas. In recent years, large Chinese
corporations also directed their investments to control—not necessarily by
buying—of large tracts of public lands leased to private producers for the
production of foods directed totally to exportation to China. Key sectors of
Argentina's economy began thus to be adapted
to the strategic interests of State and private corporations of the Asian
power.
In late 2010, public or
private consortia of China had already gained a foothold in the 23 provinces of
Argentina (Eleisegui, P., 2010, December 2). Their interests are focused on obtaining iron,
lithium, wood, and food products like rice and snuff in the north-northwest of
the country, soy and derivatives –such as soybean oil--, biodiesel and cattle
in the Pampas region, mining in the area Cuyo (west), wood and food on the
coast (east), and petroleum, iron, gas and land for soybean in Patagonia
(south). Chinese supermarkets were installed in 21 of the 23 provinces.
A brief and partial summary of
the progress of China's financial capital in key areas of Argentina's economy
—energy, mining and transport— in recent years provides a measure of the rapid
pace of the deepening “strategic partnership” of significant groups of the
Argentine ruling classes with the Chinese monopoly bourgeoisie, as well as of
the traits that is acquiring this association.
China's strong interest in
energy resources of Argentina became even more intense since the government of
Néstor Kirchner established a "strategic partnership" with the Asian
power in 2004. In April 2012 the Argentine government announced the
nationalization of 51 % of the shares of the major oil company in the country,
the formerly state-owned Yacimientos Petrolíferos Fiscales (YPF), which were in
hands of the Spanish Repsol since former President Menem privatized it in the
nineties. This is not a nationalization of the oil industry: all other
companies in this business remain in hands of foreign interests or associated
with them (Olivera, F., 2012, July 12). Repsol itself holds 6% of its shares in
YPF, and the Eskenazi family group initially retained 25% of the company. In
2007 and 2011 the Eskenazi Group had acquired the above-mentioned important
shares portion with the backing of the Kirchner administration, and with loans
from Crédit Suisse Bank and from Repsol itself, in exchange for official
approval so that it could take100% of profits and to allow shareholders to
distribute the benefits without making investments in Argentina. That way the
South American country in a few years transformed from being an exporter to
becoming an importer of energy, and by 2011 the import of fuels ended the
country's trade surplus.
Despite the
proclamation of an alleged recovery of the "energy sovereignty" for
Argentina, the government operation seemed to point rather to a reconfiguration
of alliances and of interests of foreign corporations in the oil business in
Argentina: in fact, in June 2012 the Mexican group of Carlos Slim acquired 8.4%
of the shares corresponding to the Eskenazi family, unable to pay its debt. But
well before this, Chinese state corporations had shown their interest in
advancing this field.
In 2009, two Chinese
companies, China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC), China's largest
producer of offshore oil, and China Petrochemical Corporation (SINOPEC),
offered 17 billion dollars for the entire stake of Repsol-YPF (La Nación, 2009, August 11). In 2011,
CNOOC tried to purchase in 7 billion dollars the British Petroleum's assets in
Argentina, but the operation was not completed, as it will be referred below.
On April 10,
2012, just days before the official announcement of the partial
"nationalization" of Repsol Argentina, CNOOC made a new offer for
YPF, but now, due to the lower price caused by the Argentine government's
announcement, the offer was 12 billion dollars (20% lower than a year earlier)
(elconfidencial.com, 2012, April 10).
In 2011, CNOOC earnings were 30 billion dollars, 2.5 times the amount offered
for the purchase of YPF and 70% of Argentina's international reserves. If CNOOC had bought YPF, the Chinese capital would
control 60% of the country's oil business. Analysts
say the rapid removal of concessions to Repsol by several Argentine provinces
could be a gateway to signing agreements between these provinces and CNOOC,
which would provide financing and technology to put them back into production,
with the Chinese corporation gradually occupying space Repsol left empty (Doudchitzky, Y., 2012, April 16). Although SINOPEC has also expressed its
interest in YPF, CNOOC has an advantage because the company is a partner in the
Bridas company of the Bulgheroni group, which is very close to the Kirchner
government.
In November
2011, the sale of 60% stake that British Petroleum (BP) had in the
multinational Pan American Energy (PAE), agreed several months in advance at
about 7,000 million dollars to the company Bridas, was frustrated (La Nación, 2011, November 7). The
remaining 40% of PAE has been for more than a decade in the hands of Bridas, a
holding owned 50% by brothers Carlos and Alejandro Bulgheroni of Argentina
--associated for many years with Russian interests in Argentina and in
Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, former Soviet countries of Central Asia--. The
remaining 50% is owned by CNOOC, since March 2010. The operation would have
been the largest deal in Argentina's oil industry in recent years.
The granting
of Cerro Dragón field, the most productive in the country, originally owned by
YPF, has been awarded to PAE (BP-Bridas) for a period of 20 years by former
President Carlos Menem in 1997. By then, the British-Argentine company started
to control 18% of local production of gas and oil. At that time the National
government negotiated with some provincial governments --especially those of
Salta, Neuquén, and Santa Cruz (then ruled by Néstor Kirchner)-- the
privatization of large public companies and the granting of shares of oil
company YPF (then state-owned), in exchange for the support of those governments
to a second reelection of the president, and for the promise of giving the
exploitation of underground resources to provincial governments. The concession
of Cerro Dragón to PAE, maturing in 2017, was extended with a striking
anticipation of 10 years to maturity and without public bidding, through an
agree of provincial governments of Chubut and Santa Cruz (led by Mario Das
Neves and Daniel Peralta respectively) and the National government of Néstor
Kirchner in May 2007: the original contract was extended to 40 years (until
2047, when the estimated reserve of Cerro Dragón would be virtually extinct).
CNOOC, associated with PAE through the Bridas group, then benefited from that
extension (Solari Yrigoyen, 2010, October).
The
frustration of the agreement with CNOOC to acquire the shares of BP in PAE,
whose causes were not sufficiently clarified, may be only a temporary
suspension, as both parties recognized the continuity of the negotiations.
The
agreement was sealed in November 2010 and its completion was delayed several
times. The reasons given were varied. According
to media reports, BP would have finally abandoned the transaction because the
fine imposed by the United States as a result of the oil spill in the Gulf of
Mexico –supposed reason of the sale, was lower than expected. Moreover, the government of Cristina Fernández
Kirchner did not authorize the Bulgheroni's, partners of the Chinese CNOOC, to
effectuate the purchase; in fact the operation was not approved by the National
Antitrust Commission (Clarín, 2011,
November 6). May be this were other kinds of
measures and countermeasures taken by the two governments, from the
anti-dumping restrictions adopted by Argentina in 2010 against imports from
China). The failure of the agreement was also
associated with a recent decision by the Argentine government, which, in order
to prevent further falls in dollar reserves, forced oil companies to liquidate
at the country 100% of the foreign exchange generated by exports (América Economía, 2011, November, 6). It
was also suggested the existence of internal resistance in the Argentine
government in front of the growth of the Chinese company in the local oil
business.
The
interruption of the operation surprised analysts since the Chinese Xinhua had
announced, a month before, the investment of one billion dollars in
exploration, drilling, facilities and the like, considering the acquisition
materialized (Xinhua, 2011,
October 13). Given
the Argentine government's prolific relationship with British interests in such
fields as finance, mining and oil, it should also be noted the potential impact
of the report that the United Kingdom National Defense Association (UKNDA)
issued a few weeks before the collapse of the agreement in late September 2011,
under the sponsorship of five retired members of the Military Naval and Air
Forces of Great Britain. The document considered
that the peaceful attitude that Argentina maintained in recent years on the
Malvinas (Falkland) Islands issue "may change from night to morning"
that these territories are "a ripe plum waiting to be taken" by
Argentina with the aid from China, "his ally", and that the newly
found oil in the area makes the Malvinas (Falkland) Islands even more
attractive, especially for China (China.org, 2011, September 28). The declaration
could be an answer to China's support for Argentina's claim of sovereignty over
those territories, following statements by the British Defense Minister, Liam
Fox, who warned that his country could use naval power to secure the occupation
of the islands (La Nación, 2011, June 27). Argentine-British
relations became turbid in those days in respect to the historic colonial
question of the Malvinas (Falkland) Islands: Argentina received the explicit
support of the member countries of the "Group of 77" and of China.
PAE, the
second oil company in Argentina, is still a society participated by 60% British
share capital (British Petroleum), 20% Russian-Argentine share capital
(Bulgheroni), and the remaining 20% Chinese share capitals (CNOOC), managed by
the Bulgheroni brothers (Bridas).
Moreover,
despite repeated friction between the government and oil companies on oil
production, price and supply of fuels, the Chinese-Argentine company Bridas
assured the acquisition of the local subsidiary of Exxon Mobil, for 800 million
dollars. The agreement includes the transfer of a refinery in the town of
Campana (Buenos Aires province), a lubricants plant, three fuel distribution
terminals and a network of over 500 stations. With the purchase of Esso Argentina,
the Chinese-Argentine Bridas took control of 13.7% of the market for fuels and
diesel, plus 17% it has in the production of oil and natural gas by
participating in PAE. So, Bridas occupies the second place as an integrated oil
group in Argentina, behind Repsol-YPF.
The
operations described above show the powerful impact of Chinese share capital in
the Argentine oil sector. These perspectives were increased from the
above-mentioned association of State-owned CNOOC with Bridas and BP in the
consortium PAE. The Bulgheroni family, which owns 50% of Bridas, thereby joined
the mighty sector of Argentine bourgeoisie associated to private or State
capital of China.
When the
alliance Bridas-CNOOC was sealed, the president of the Chinese corporation,
Yang Hua, pronounced these significant words: "Bridas, with a portfolio of
global assets in oil and gas, it is a very good top place for us to enter in
Latin America" (La Voz de San Carlos, 2010, March 15). If it had finalized the total transfer of PAE
to Bridas, China's CNOOC would have controlled 80% of one of the major oil
companies in Argentina.
Precisely
with the brokering of Bridas —through Carlos Bulgheroni, one of the owners of
the company, new contacts took place between YPF and CNOOC in late June 2012.
According to news reports, CNOOC confirmed its interest in investing in
Argentine oil, but with four conditions that would notoriously limit the
ability of decision-making on National resources: 1) the updating of local
prices to align with international ones – for example, considering oil a
commodity as any other and not a strategic good related to National sovereignty
in energy--, 2) security in Argentine assets (possibly the production of the
field Vaca Muerta, in the province of Neuquén), 3) absolute freedom to export
oil and gas extracted in Argentina, and 4) an agreement for the transfer of
profits abroad (La Nación, 2012, July 10).
In April
2011 China's SINOPEC Corporation purchased the Argentine unit of Occidental
Petroleum (Oxy), participating in 23 exploration and production concessions in
Santa Cruz, Mendoza and Chubut, with proven and probable reserves of 393
million barrels. According to the company, the production of these fields is
over 51,000 barrels per day, 1% of Chinese oil imports. Oxy's concessions in
Santa Cruz should mature in 2017, but the company had already obtained its
extension. In this southern province —and territory of political origin of
Presidents Néstor and Cristina Kirchner, the now Chinese-owned Oxy (Occidental
Argentina Exploration and Production) is one of the largest producers of crude
oil in the country (Observatorio
Petrolero Sur, 2011, February 24).
With the
acquisitions of local assets already made by the Chinese state oil companies
CNOOC and SINOPEC, China rose from 29th to 3rd place
among foreign investors in Argentina. According to analysts, from April to
October 2011, China's share in the Argentine oil business rose from 5% to over
30% (Doudchitzky, Y.,
2011, October, 26). So, China is firmly
positioned among the powers that have strong interests and compete to expand
their spheres of influence in the field of energy production in Argentina and
the region.
In January 2011, the company
Tierra del Fuego Energía y Química SA (TFEyQ) —name under which the Shaanxi
Coal and Chemical Industry Group operates in Argentina (70% owned by the
Chinese state)-- and the Ministry of Industry of the southern Province Tierra
del Fuego, announced the agreement by which the former will invest one billion
dollars in two years in building a plant to manufacture fertilizers, a power
plant that will supply this factory, and its own harbor in the province. Local
construction company Roggio runs these works. The Chinese company will benefit
from tax exemptions provided by law for industrial promotion in the province,
in addition to tax concessions enjoyed by Patagonian harbors, as it will be
addressed below. The local government is committed to providing the company
with 1.5 million cubic meters of gas, basic input for the urea plant, at a
price five times lower than the market one, with the only condition that the
company to pays the volume of gas involved two years in advance (La Nación, 2011, March 6).
In terms of mining
exploitation, the Argentine government has actively been encouraging Chinese companies
to join American, Australian and Canadian share capitals currently prevailing
in that field.
The immediate background of
the Chinese arrival to large mining activities in the Andean provinces is the
agreement signed in January 2010 in Beijing with several Chinese companies by
Argentine Secretary of the Mining —and entrepreneur in this industry, Jorge
Mayoral. The signing of the agreement occurred at a meeting entitled “Argentina
Mining: Investment Opportunities”, organized by the Ministry of Planning and
Public Investment of Argentina and the Ministry of Natural Resources of China,
to offer investment opportunities to Chinese corporations that exploit gold,
uranium, potassium borate, lithium and copper mining (Ministerio
de Planificación Federal, 2012, November 12).
In the province of Rio Negro
(center-south), the Chinese company Metallurgical Corporation of China (MCC)
operates the ferriferous mine of Sierra Grande. This is the largest iron mine
in Argentina, the once historic enterprise Hipasam (Hierro Patagónico Sociedad Anónima Minera), assigned to the Chinese corporation in 2005
for reactivation, by then Governor Miguel Saiz, backed by the National
government. This was the first major investment of Chinese capital in
Argentina. In the town of Sierra Grande employment increased; in return, the
concession contract granted to MCC the facilities and underground wealth for 99
years or until the ore runs out, in exchange for only 6 million dollars and 2%
of gross production as royalties. There are proved reserves to extract iron for
at least 50 years (Río Negro, 2009, January 26; Grupo de
Reflexión Rural, 2011, February 4).
Along with those easy terms,
MCC got the harbor Punta Colorada, whose exports benefit from tax concessions
enjoyed by Patagonian harbors. At National level, mineral exports pay a paltry
3% royalty, but in Patagonian harbors only pay a fee of 1%. The Chinese
company, like all foreign mining ones, benefits from the mining laws enacted by
the neoliberal government of Carlos Menem, now in effect, that exempted those
companies from payment of municipal and provincial taxes during the first 5
years and fix the tax burden for 30 years. The royalties paid to the State are
calculated based on what the companies declare, without an audit by the State.
Those companies do not pay import duties or customs duties, and they can
transfer 100% of their capital and profits abroad (Laufer, R., 2012-2013).
In July 2010 the governor of
the province of La Rioja (northwest), Luis Beder Herrera, was part of the entourage
of President Cristina Fernández Kirchner on her trip to Beijing, and in
November he visited the Shandong Province in China. In March 2011 the governor
travelled to La Rioja to implement an agreement signed between the government
of this province and the Chinese company Shandong Gold to explore gold mines in
Famatina.
La Rioja, with varied proven
mineral reserves in its territory, remains one of the provinces with highest
poverty rates in Argentina. Shandong Gold is a part of Shandong Group, a giant
holding company with businesses and interests in different fields, including
real estate. It is one of the four largest mining corporations in the world: it
handles 40% of gold produced in China, and listed on the Shanghai Gold
Exchange. It should be recalled that China is the largest gold producer in the
world and the second largest consumer worldwide.
A year before said agreement,
the residents of the towns of Chilecito, Famatina and La Rioja (capital of La
Rioja province) had constituted the so-called Citizens Assemblies, and
performed protests and blockades in the road to Mina El Oro, located in the
Famatina mountain —about 30 km from Chilecito city, in the northern part of the
province— to preventively avoid the passage of mining vehicles, as part of a
long struggle in defense of the country's natural resources and against
open-pit mining. Previously, the movement had led to failure the landing in the
region of Barrick Gold, “of diffuse capitals and Canadian appearance”, as some
analysts described (La vaca, 2010,
March 25), and later the one of the Shandong Gold itself. At present it can be
argued that the movement culminates a new chapter of great popular movements,
getting the suspension of similar agreements that the provincial leader, Luis
Beder Herrera, signed with the Canadian Osisko Mining, after passing the law,
while he was governor of the province, banning the open-pit mining, which he
had promoted in his campaign a few months earlier (Perfil, 2012, January 27).
Another outcome of the meeting
mentioned was the mining agreement between the government of the northern
province of Jujuy with the Chinese consortium Sanhe Hopefull Grain & Oil
Group, associated with the group Sociedad Macri (Socma, based in Argentina,
owned by Franco Macri) in the railway Belgrano Cargas. On the occasion, the
Secretary of Mining, Jorge Mayoral, on behalf of the National government, also
applauded an investment of the Chinese company MCC —which operates the
aforementioned project of iron mining of Sierra Grande in the province of Rio
Negro, for starting the running of mining exploration activities in the
province of San Juan (west)[3].
In occasion of his visit to
Buenos Aires in late June 2012, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao reaffirmed the strategic partnership with Argentina, and
he also granted a loan from the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China to
finance the reactivation of the Belgrano Cargas railroad. The investment would
reach about 2,500 million dollars in four years to rehabilitate 1,400
kilometers of track, 50 locomotives and 2,550 wagons.
In accordance with the variety
of resources both the Chinese government and private corporations are intended
to attract, they try to ensure logistics for their extraction and their
internal and external transport. The June 2012 agreement reactivated or updated
other agreements by nearly 10 billion dollars in loans and investments for the
provision of rolling stock (locomotives, wagons and even rails) signed during
the trip of President Cristina Fernández Kirchner to China in July 2010. As
agreed then, a substantial portion of the loan would be used so that Argentina
purchases equipment and technology to state-owned enterprises China Northern
Railway and China Southern Railway for the Belgrano Cargas railway, including
the renewal of said extension of rails (which once were manufactured by the
domestic steel industry). Chinese Banks China National Machinery &
Equipment Import & Export Corp. and Development Bank Corp. would be
responsible for 85% of the funding (Scalabrini Ortiz, M., 2011, May)[4]. Despite the exponential growth of bilateral
trade, the project was never launched, either because of difficulties of
Argentina to contribute to the remaining 15% of funding, due the economic,
financial and monetary crisis affecting the country by rebound from the world
crisis (Castro, J.,
2012, June 12), or either because the
Chinese government linked the performance of the agreement with the evolution
of its claims against Argentine trade restrictions on imports from China.
According to the above-mentioned analyst, probably the Chinese vice president
proposed to the president of Argentina a formula to include also the 15%
shortfall in financing the Belgrano Cargas corresponding to the Latin American
country. This would involve the corresponding increase of Argentina's debt with
its partner. But also, as with other powers, the main role of Chinese banks is
not to grant the loan, but to set the conditions to be met by the host country,
and to make sure that equipment and technology is being provided by China.
This is a strategic railway
line. In 2004 the government of Néstor Kirchner granted the company to the
Macri group, partner in the consortium with the Chinese group Shima Sanhe
Hopeful Grain & Oil, along with some major business groups and a selected
group of union leaders. Franco Macri was
the founder of one of two Argentine-Chinese chambers of commerce,
then merged. In 2006 the Chinese
government appointed investment
adviser for all of Latin America.
In that same year he had served as intermediary of the Chinese state-owned
Guodian for joint projects between Socma (Sociedad Macri) and the Argentinean
government and provinces in various types of energy (hydroelectric, wind,
thermal and generated by natural gas and coal), as with other Chinese companies
for projects in electricity and rail infrastructure and improvement of ports[5].
The agreements of 2010 also
included the electrification of a railway line between the cities of La Plata
and Buenos Aires. It was a total of ten projects for a period of two to five
years, with purchases of equipment to China and Chinese investments in
Argentina. The agreed acquisitions would be financed by Citic, a Chinese
financial holding having the entrepreneur Franco Macri as “trader” on
commission. It is intended for financing and payment of commission, estimated
at 4% —i.e. 400 million dollars—what
could have been devoted to a systematic National plan for full recovery of
activity and the rail industry in state hands (Cena, J.C., 2010, July 30).
The Belgrano Cargas is a vital
structure for the transport of raw materials, as it crosses several provinces
of central and northern Argentina. It has stations at ports of Barranqueras,
Rosario and Buenos Aires and connects through Bolivia and northern Chile with
the exit to the Pacific Ocean. Ernesto Fernandez Taboada, director of the
Chamber of Production, Industry and Commerce Argentine-China, said: “Beijing considers logistics and
transportation of grains as a strategic issue, which is why they come to invest
in Argentina.” (Eleisegui,
P., and Pdeqdigital.com). Businessman Carlos Spadone chairs this Chamber, and
Franco Macri, one of the grantees of that railway line, is honorary chairman.
The role of the Belgrano
Cargas, which ensures the exit of Argentine agricultural production, specially
soy, to the Asian country, now reinforced with the participation of China,
follows the same logic of the installation of British railways in late 19th and
early 20th century in Argentina. This consolidated an international division of
labor in which the South American country is again specialized in the
production of exportable commodities and the import of capital and of
industrial goods. In this role local participation plays a key role: an
intermediary role that is exercised internally, in this case through business
group headed by Sociedad Macri (Socma) and its Chinese partner Sanhe Hopefull
Grain & Oil.
Conclusion
Chinese leaders stress that
their industrial economy is complementary
to the economies of the region. They describe commercial links and the
establishment of capitals from the Asian power in Latin American economies as
an opportunity that would enable
countries in the region to develop their products, diversify exports, give
autonomy to their International Relations and reduce their foreign debt. In
correspondence, some leadership sectors of Argentina and other Latin American
countries promote the adaptation of
National and regional economies to the complementarity with China, and in this
direction operate politically from within and outside governments.
China has become one of the
new emerging powers that are competing for preferences and alliances of the
ruling classes in Argentina. This affects economic and political developments
of the country and emphasizes conflicts of interests of different powers to
gain influent positions over the basic resources of the economy and state
structures. The successive alliances with hegemonic or rising powers (Ciafardini
H., 1990) reinforced the traits of dependency and backwardness that were in the
background of gestation and burst of the deeper economic, social and political
crisis of the Argentine history in 2001.
Latin American countries have
developed similar modes of International insertion in the world, which recently
have been shifting towards China; and Argentina is not the exception to the
rule. Their heterodoxy in International Relations do not consist of prospects
of autonomy but they are intended to untie American influence through a growing
attachment to the rising world power: a mode of International relations, as
discussed above, which perpetuates characteristic structures of a more
traditional International division of labor that, according to historical
experience, has not contributed to the independence of Latin American nations
but, at best, to a displacement of dependencies.
The strategic partnership with
China is usually presented in terms of opportunities
and challenges. The growth of a
middle class in the most populous country on earth is considered a great opportunity to “Argentina to integrate
supply chains” centered on China. For resource-rich countries such as
Argentina, the prospect of economic development would intend that the country
becomes a major trading partner of the Asian power ensuring the provision of
energy, industrial supplies and food. At the same time this way of developing
would pose the challenge of trying to
sell to China not only commodities but also processed products that add value
to agricultural capacity of Argentina, and the need to face the invasion of the
domestic market by products manufactured by the Asian power. However,
dependence of the purchaser market, in contrast, opens the way both to the
demand of opening the National market and could generate possible trade
pressures through the restrictions of the Chinese buyer market. At the same
time, this dependence reinforces the tendency of some sectors of the local
elites to consolidate the primary-export specialization.
The modality of Chinese
investments in the region, meanwhile, does not differ substantially from the
ones of previous dominant powers in relation to Latin American countries: its
central purpose is to serve the needs of industrial development in China by
facilitating accumulation of profits and the production, transport and export
of raw materials and food to the Asian country, that often requires that the
substantial part of the project and the needed materials and services be
performed and provided by China (Lum, T., 2009, November 25).
The promise of a comprehensive
and lasting market and a significant supply of capital is the incentive that
drives large sectors of local landowners and capitalists to associate with the
rising power and to become their domestic intermediaries. On this basis they
promote the re-orientation of the country's external relations towards the new
privileged partner, sometimes in a complex web of rivalries and alliances with
sectors of the ruling classes linked to other economic and political centers.
This was shown in Argentina, for example, with the aforementioned struggle
between British interests, Chinese and others who make up society
CNOOC-Bridas-BP in the oil company PAE, and its political manifestations
through the strong ties of these groups with the national government and that
of the province of Chubut.
As in the rest of Latin
America, currently strategic partnership with the rising Chinese capitalism
seems to offer no basis for a National economic development, independent and
self-sustaining. As warn in a recent publication on China-Latin American
relations, two scholars of the regional reality affirm: “Despite the readiness of Chinese
enterprises to invest in Latin American infrastructure, the prevailing exchange
of the region’s natural resources for Chinese consumer products—the very
exchange that Chinese investment seeks to deepen—is unlikely to provide a
sustainable path of development” (León-Manríquez, J. L. and Hearn, A. H., 2011,
p. 286). For this very reason, this way of International
insertion thus carries no prospects for greater autonomy but, at most, a
diversification or reorientation of economic and political dependencies and
recreation of a “special connection” with a new global hegemon: a path, as
proves the historical experience, divergent or opposite to the ancient and
recurrent efforts in favor of a course of development and integration of Latin
America based on criteria of independence and cooperation, not oriented to the
benefit of the popular majorities and of the capacity of sovereign decision by
the Nations of the region.
About the author
Rubén Laufer is a
graduate in History in the Universidad de Buenos Aires (U.B.A., Argentina). He
teaches at the undergraduate and graduate levels in the Faculties of Economics,
of Social Sciences and of Philosophy at the U.B.A. He’s a researcher at the
Institute of Historical, Economic, Social and International Studies (IDEHESI)
and of the Program of Studies in History of International Relations of Latin
America (PEHRIAL).
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[1] In Argentina, when intensive
planting of soybean began —in the early1990, 5 million hectares were
cultivated.
[2] The figures
vary greatly from other sources. A study by the Institute for the Study of
Argentina and Latin American Reality (IERAL) under the Mediterranean
Foundation, estimates that the revenue from export duties would be reduced by
770 million over the previous year's level.
[3]
In his book El
mal: el modelo K y la Barrick Gold. Amos y
servidores en el saqueo de la Argentina (2011), the investigative journalist and former
government deputy Miguel Bonasso denounces the murky origins of this mining
corporation and its close ties with that company, among other politicians and officials
of the country, the National Mining Secretary, Jorge Mayoral, and the governor
of the province of San Juan, José Luis Gioja.
[4] See also Doudchitzky, Y. (2011,
November 9). “Todos los caminos conducen a China”, Zaichina.
[5] In 2008 Franco Macri, as representative of the Chinese government
corporation Citic in Argentina, reached an agreement with the then Transport
Secretary Ricardo Jaime for the purchase of Chinese subway cars, a situation
currently under judicial investigation over the payment of over-prices with
false invoices or payments to “ghost companies”. The Chinese company is also a
financing bank, and it provides part of the millionaire funding for purchases
of rolling stock that the Argentine government agreed during the presidential
visit in July 2010.