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BRASILIA (Reuters) - Brazil will pursue trade negotiations with the U.S. while reaffirming its support for multilateralism and seeking to expand its network of trade agreements, Foreign Trade Secretary Tatiana Prazeres said on Thursday.
"Our approach (with the U.S.) is to negotiate, negotiate, and negotiate - that's what we've been doing," Prazeres said at an event organized by the Brazil-China Business Council (CEBC).
She stressed that increasing sales to the European Union - with whom the South American Mercosur bloc hopes to ratify a long-awaited trade deal- could help diversify exports.
Mercosur is also advancing talks with EFTA, the European Free Trade Association formed by Norway, Switzerland, Iceland and Liechtenstein, she noted.
According to Prazeres, Latin America's largest economy could benefit from trade flow shifts caused by sweeping new tariffs announced earlier this month by U.S. President Donald Trump's administration, as occurred in the past when Brazilian soybean exports to China surged during Trump's first term.
However, she emphasized that Brazil does not favor a scenario of volatile and unilateral tariff swings hampering the global economy, emphasizing that for some commodities, Brazil simply does not have a market that can replace what China buys.
"There are significant risks for the global economy, international trade, and trade governance," she warned.
"Brazil has always supported multilateralism and rules-based trade and does not want to see the current situation deteriorate."
On China, Brazil's top trade partner and a major buyer of its soybeans, iron ore and crude oil, Prazeres said that removing sanitary, phytosanitary and regulatory barriers could significantly boost Brazilian exports.
She also called the bilateral relationship "dual," noting that while China is a major buyer of Brazilian goods, its exports also put pressure on domestic industries such as consumer goods and automobiles.
Chinese investment in Brazil's auto sector and in productive capacity has helped ease some of those tensions, said Prazeres.
(Reporting by Marcela Ayres; Editing by Marguerita Choy)
