Sustainability Analysis of Sino-Brazilian Bilateral Trade: A Case Study of the 2020 Global Epidemic Event

Introduction

Pearce believes that “sustainable development is that today's use should not reduce future real income”, “when development can maintain the current people's welfare increase, it will not reduce the welfare of future generations as well (“Sustainable development”, n.d.). With the rapid growth of the world economy and the intensifying development of economic globalization, the growth of international trade has been significantly accelerated. International trade has become one of the important pillars for an increasing number of developing and even developed countries, playing an increasingly important role in the tide of economic globalization and liberalization (Li, 2010).

Sudden developments in the current affairs of the world are undoubtedly a major threat to the sustainable development of international trade. Since the end of 2019, COVID-19 has first spread at an unprecedented rate in China. In this respect, the occurrence of international public health emergencies will have a negative impact on international trade (Bai, 2019).

With the outbreak of COVID-19, international epidemic prevention and control has seriously affected global economic and trade exchanges and international economic cooperation. Considering the delay in the withdrawal of epidemic prevention and control measures and the carry-over effect of the epidemic, the impact on the global economy and trade will be far-reaching. The outbreak of COVID-19 is fast, long-lasting and has a wide-ranging impact. It not only interferes with the establishment of foreign trade enterprises, increases foreign trade costs, and reduces international demand, it also causes the restructuring of the global industrial chain and supply chain, creating uncertainties in global policy forecasts, thus producing a serious negative impact on international trade (Shen, 2020). Particularly for some developing countries, the low standard of medical technology and inadequate national infrastructure lead to an uncontrolled number of patients, leading to huge losses for these countries in all aspects of civil society, the economy, and politics.

The epidemic has caused huge losses to relevant industries and international trade. It also has fueled protectionism, prompted some countries to review their industrial layout and opening-up policies, and accelerated the localization and diversification of global supply chains. Globalization in the post-pandemic era will undergo profound adjustments. (Yuan, 2020). Not only that, but the impact of COVID-19 on international financial management has been enormous. The pandemic is likely to wreak havoc on fragile states, cause massive destruction and severely test crisis management systems (Zizek, 2020).

To this end, this paper aims to select specific and relatively representative bilateral international trade cases in the context of the epidemic to prove the threat to the sustainable development of the global economy and the new vitality of the global economy after the epidemic from a small perspective. As China and Brazil are important emerging economies in the world, China is the world's second largest economy and largest trading nation. Brazil is the largest economy in Latin America, the second largest economy in the Americas, and China's largest trading partner in the region. Bilateral trade relations are of great significance to the economic development of both countries (Chen et al., 2018).

In addition, it can be found from literature collection that although scholars have always discussed Sino-Brazilian trade from various angles, there are relatively few comparative studies on Sino-Brazilian trade before and after the background of global epidemic emergencies. Therefore, this paper further selects the bilateral trade between China and Brazil as a case study. This paper hopes to analyze the view that international trade can bring economic win-win results for both countries by describing the cases of China and Brazil recovering trade and strengthening international cooperation from the disruption of international trade in the context of the epidemic.