Brazil is preparing for the Carnival this weekend, when the nation actually involves a halt, however hectic preparations are underway in Brasilia for President Lula da Silva’s upcoming go to to India with a enterprise delegation of 260 firms.
The most important-ever Brazilian delegation to India marks the fruits of the highest-level engagement between the 2 nations over the previous few years — in a difficult geopolitical situation. This may be the Brazilian chief’s final main international engagement earlier than Brazil will get into election mode for the presidential polls in October this yr.
Following Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s bilateral assembly with Lula in Brasilia in July 2025, after they mentioned the enlargement of bilateral commerce, the Brazilian chief’s journey to New Delhi, from February 19 to 21, is being given high precedence by the Brazilian authorities.
Celso Amorim, who serves as Lula’s principal international coverage adviser, sees the go to as a possibility for collaboration in strategic sectors between two rising economies. “Cooperation between Brazil and India might be very broad, however I might spotlight above all two domains: expertise and defence,” Mr. Amorim informed The Hindu.
“Brazil and India have developed, every in its personal method, essential facets of biotechnology too. In house science, India has given us an important instance of how it’s potential to realize nice accomplishments with out essentially resorting to the expertise of the wealthy nations,” stated Mr. Amorim, who has earlier served as International Minister and Defence Minister beneath Presidents Lula and Dilma Rouseff, respectively.
For the reason that 2025 bilateral assembly, the Brazilian aspect has been working to strengthen its commerce ties with India. Jorge Viana, head of the Brazilian Commerce and Funding Promotion Company (Apex Brazil), informed The Hindu that Lula requested him final yr to place collectively a delegation as a part of his efforts to broaden business ties with India.
“In Delhi, the President will take part within the Synthetic Intelligence summit, however we’re additionally organising an enormous enterprise assembly in collaboration with our International Ministry. Apex can be opening an workplace in Delhi as we see India, probably the most populous nation, as one of many economies with the best potential for development,” Mr. Viana informed The Hindu from Brasília. “Until final yr, India was our tenth largest buying and selling companion, however now in latest months it has been competing to be the fifth. It might develop into the third largest.”
In 2025, Brazil bought Indian merchandise value $8.5 billion, whereas Brazilian exports to India totalled $7 billion — primarily in oil, sugar, molasses, fat and vegetable oils and iron ore sectors. Nonetheless, Mr. Viana says, Brazilians now need to diversify their exports to India.
“We have now 260 Brazilian firms attending the occasion that Apex is organising in Delhi. We have now representatives from all strategic sectors. We’re taking lots of people from the well being space, together with our Well being Minister, as a result of India is a significant provider of medicines to Brazil. We even have essential firms of ethanol and biofuel onboard as a result of there may be already an settlement between Brazil and India within the space.” He added that there might be a significant announcement in regards to the arrival of Embraer, the Brazilian plane manufacturing agency, in India.
With power safety and sustainability reshaping international alignments — and threatening to rupture the prevailing world order amid intensifying geopolitical rivalries — the Brazilian aspect is eager to deepen engagement with India in these areas. “We have now to work collectively for the power transition, with out forgetting that we nonetheless have a big commerce in oil. We can’t, from one hour to the subsequent, abandon oil, however we do must work in order that the world is extra sustainable. And sustainable not solely from the financial and power standpoint, but additionally from political standpoint,” says Mr. Amorim, who has been one of the vital influential Brazilian voices in worldwide affairs for twenty years.
Whereas commerce might dominate Lula’s agenda in Delhi, Brazil can be taking a look at India’s presidency of BRICS in 2026 to additional advance the dialog on international governance and multilateralism which is beneath risk. For Mr. Amorim, the grouping should debate on reforming the worldwide order to replicate the pursuits of the International South.
“It can be crucial that the Indian presidency of BRICS leads this dialogue in regards to the present world order and learn how to change it. Everyone knows the wrestle there may be for the enlargement of the UN Safety Council. A world with out guidelines is a really troublesome world. India and Brazil have all the time labored with guidelines — the principles that they helped to construct and that benefited us. And that is solely potential inside a balanced multilateral system, which BRICS has to assist strengthen and rebuild,” stated the adviser to Lula.
With U.S. President Donald Trump throwing out the rulebook on worldwide commerce, rising economies have begun to discover extra commerce with different nations and blocs. Just some weeks earlier than India signed a Free Commerce Settlement (FTA) with the EU, the South American commerce bloc Mercosur, which Brazil is a part of, additionally finalised its pact with the Europeans. Now, the long-pending Mercosur-India FTA may come up for severe dialogue throughout Lula’s go to.
“The stress of the U.S. with the entire world has generated alternatives for nations like Brazil, which don’t have any disputes with anybody. The Mercosur–EU settlement is shifting ahead effectively. Although it’s a multilateral settlement and entails many tariffs, we’ll talk about it with the Indian aspect,” stated Mr. Viana, who’s a member of Lula’s Employees Celebration and an in depth confidant of the President.
Brazil is but to agree on a commerce cope with the U.S. However, with the largest-ever enterprise delegation to India in his third time period as president, the Brazilian chief is taking a look at placing massive offers with a fellow BRICS member earlier than returning dwelling after the Carnival is over.
Printed – February 11, 2026 04:21 pm IST