Albanese flies to South America on trade rescue mission after Trump victory
By David Crowe
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese is seeking to meet Chinese President Xi Jinping within days to shore up a $327 billion economic relationship, as the United States election result triggers fears of global trade wars.
Albanese will hold talks with global leaders at two summits in a bid to cement free trade agreements despite the prospect of mammoth tariffs when Donald Trump takes office as US president in January.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese will attend two international summits in coming weeks.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen
Leaders from across the Asia-Pacific region will gather in Peru from Thursday for an annual economic summit, followed by a G20 summit in Brazil early next week.
While US President Joe Biden will attend both summits, Trump will overshadow the talks as world leaders brace for the impact of his stated trade policies, such as 60 per cent tariffs on Chinese goods.
The prime minister played down the prospect of a hit to the Australian economy from Trump’s policies, saying he had a good phone conversation with the president-elect last week.
“We had a terrific discussion last week,” he said while campaigning in Tasmania. “Good beginning to our relationship. He described the relationship – that we would have a perfect friendship.
“And I’m very confident that the relationship between Australia and the United States will continue to be very strong.”
Albanese said in a statement the two summits came at an important time when nations were working on the global inflation challenge.
Albanese leaves Australia on Wednesday to attend the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Lima, the annual gathering of leaders from 21 nations, and is expected to meet Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto soon after his arrival.
While other talks are yet to be finalised, Australian officials expect the prime minister to speak with Xi at the APEC gathering or the G20 summit, either for an informal discussion or a formal meeting.
Australia’s two-way trade with China grew 9 per cent last year to $327 billion, according to the Department of Foreign Affairs, and has gained from the removal of Chinese restrictions on coal, barley, wine, lobster and other exports.
In one source of tension, Taiwanese envoy Lin Hsin-Li will attend the Lima summit with a plea to other leaders to let the country join the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a trade group of 11 nations including Australia, Japan, Canada, New Zealand, Singapore and others.
While the Albanese government is open to this request, it says Taiwan can join only if there is a consensus among all TPP members. While China is not a member of the TPP, it strongly opposes the group accepting Taiwan.
The APEC summit will be a demonstration of China’s economic strength, with Xi joining Peruvian President Dina Boluarte at the opening of a port funded by Chinese investors.
Peru is the world’s biggest copper exporter by volume, while Chile is the largest by value, according to the World Bank. Australia is the third-biggest producer by value after those two countries.
In a sign of the way global leaders are preparing for a new American president, Subianto was in the US capital on Tuesday to meet Biden at the White House, but he also posted a video on social media to show he had held a phone conversation with Trump.
Biden is expected to focus on climate change as a key issue at the G20 and will visit Manaus on the Amazon River to emphasise the threat to the surrounding rainforest.
Albanese is not expected to hold a formal meeting with Biden at the G20, given they met at the president’s home in Delaware in September, but is expected to meet Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
This year’s United Nations climate summit comes to an end in Baku, Azerbaijan, on November 22, days after world leaders discuss the environment at the G20 in Rio de Janeiro.
Australia was a founding member of APEC, which was strongly backed by then-prime minister Paul Keating as an economic initiative. The group now includes 21 nations with 60 per cent of global economic output.
The G20 accounts for 85 per cent of global economic output and its members include the US, China, Russia and other major economies. Russian President Vladimir Putin has indicated he will not go to Rio because his attendance would “wreck” the summit.
Cut through the noise of federal politics with news, views and expert analysis. Subscribers can sign up to our weekly Inside Politics newsletter.