Here’s a key news item the international media preferred to censor:
Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva delivered a pointed lesson in economic policy to the G7 leaders in the second session of their summit on June 17, where “Economic Growth and Global Imbalances” was the topic. Stop complaining about Chinese “competition,” and join China in investing in the development of Africa and other Global South countries! It will be good for your economies, good for our economies, and good for the world, he told them.
“It is difficult for me to take part in this debate because we are caught between two worlds. We find ourselves in a world where highly developed nations are preoccupied with China’s growth and competitiveness. Meanwhile, on the other side, another part of the world is waiting for anyone willing to step forward as trade and investment partners,” he began.
The hundreds of millions of people in Latin America, in Africa, in India who want to enjoy an “average standard of consumption,” are a gigantic market waiting out there for you. Investing in their development “will benefit the economy of the United States, Europe, and so many other countries. It is necessary to look at the world,” he urged. He proposed that President Trump put this discussion on the agenda of the G20 meeting which he will host later this year, because China will also be at the table.
“There is no point in sitting around this table complaining about China. Germany is thinking about China solely from its own perspective. The United States and France are doing the same. We have to move away from this individual perspective and look at global imbalances as a whole. When are we going to turn 900 million Africans into consumers? It is when they receive the necessary investment and interest from the industries of developed countries.”
China has stepped in to fill the void “left open by your absence.” When Brazil holds international tenders for building roads, he noted, French, German, U.S. companies, for example, do not participate. “Who shows up? The Chinese.”
He insisted: “What we need is to change our behavior, to look beyond our borders, and to understand that only development will generate what we desire.”
Global military spending, which reached $3 trillion last year, will not do that. German Chancellor Merz startled me, Lula reported, “when he said that his country spent 15 billion euros on the war in Ukraine. This money could be invested in developing Germany’s partners.”
“Let us take advantage of the 21st century and do things differently from what we did in the 20th century. It is extremely positive to have China and India growing. That is 2.8 billion people consuming. Adding Brazil and Indonesia, that would be over 3 billion people. I want everyone to consume. And it is the developed countries that must get the ball rolling….
“Let us invest in peace. Enough of making war!”
The only response President Donald Trump could come up with, in his June 19 Axios interview, was that he considers Lula da Silva, because of his G7 summit speeches, to be “volatile.”
