As Trump talks tariffs, his Argentine ally welcomes a first shipload of Chinese EVs

[AP Photo]

The vast field of over 5,800 electric and hybrid vehicles gleamed on the cargo deck of the BYD Changzhou, a Chinese container vessel unloading yesterday [Macau time] at a river port in eastern Argentina.

In other places, such a scene would not be noteworthy. Chinese automaker BYD has sped up its exports and undercut rivals the world over, alarming Washington, upsetting Western and Japanese auto giants and unnerving local industries across Southeast Asia, Africa and Latin America.

But the sight of so many new Chinese EVs gliding onto a muddy river bank in Buenos Aires province was unprecedented for Argentina, its crisis-stricken economy dominated for years by a left-wing populist movement that protected local industry with stiff tariffs and import restrictions.

“For decades people in Argentina had this vision that everything here must be manufactured here,” said Claudio Damiano, a professor in the Institute of Transportation at Argentina’s National University of San Martin. “The boat has a symbolic value as the first step for BYD. Everyone’s wondering how far it will go.”

The shipment also came in stark contrast to the news in Brussels, where on Wednesday European Union lawmakers voted to delay ratification of a landmark free trade deal with the Mercosur group of South American countries, including Argentina, which promises to tear down trade barriers for European industrial imports and supercharge consumption of German EVs.

“For the Europeans, there’s just no possibility of competing with the Chinese,” Damiano said.

Argentina became one of the region’s most closed economies under Kirchnerism — the movement formed by ex-President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner and her late husband, former President Néstor Kirchner, which championed the rights of the downtrodden, defaulted on sovereign debt and disdained global trade as a destructive force.

A chronically depreciating peso and sky-high taxes constrained consumer choice, compelling well-heeled Argentines to smuggle iPhones and Zara hauls into the country when returning from vacations abroad.

Fed up with cycles of economic crisis, Argentines vaulted radical libertarian President Javier Milei to power in 2023. He railed against Kirchnerism, vowed to destroy the state and praised U.S. President Donald Trump as an ideological soulmate.

For the last two years, Milei has has done the exact opposite of his most powerful ally in Washington.

While Trump has waged trade wars, Milei has flung open Argentina’s doors to imports, slashed trade barriers, unwound customs red tape and shored up the local currency to make foreign goods more affordable.

Last year Argentina logged a record 30% increase in imports compared to the year before — much of it in the form of $3 milk frothers and $10 dresses piling up on Argentines’ doorsteps from Asian online retailers such as Temu and Shein.

Now Chinese automakers — once choked by 35% levies on imports — are seizing on a new measure to allow 50,000 electric and hybrid cars into the country this year tariff-free. The first shipment arrived Monday at Zárate Port after a 23-day voyage from Singapore. ISABEL & VICTOR CAIVANO, ZÁRATE, MDT/AP