The Chinese economy strong growth in recent years has been accompanied by an increase in its needs for natural resources to meet the growing demand of its industry. In this context, the African continent has become an important supplier of raw materials to China, since that continent is regarded as one of the areas with latest dominance of natural resources still underused. Chinese presence in Africa has cause a change in that the region's economic relationship with Brazil. Given this scenario, the study aims at analyzing the economic relations between Brazil and South Africa - Africa's largest economy and a major market for Brazilian exports. By using the constant-market-share model, we analyzed Brazilian gains and losses in terms of competitiveness in South African market and evaluated the Chinese potential contribution to those losses.
Brazilian exports; Chinese competition; constant-market-share model