"A dragon with different faces: Could China contribute to sustainable investment in the Amazon? -4 March 2022-

...The recent revelations made by the Peruvian press about large Chinese construction companies in consortium with an inexperienced local company, offer us the brushstroke that was missing to know the behaviour of Chinese companies in the country...On the one hand, we have Cosco Shipping, the main shareholder of the port of Chancay, with a strategic and disruptive proposal. This port, designed to receive Post Panamax ships, the largest in the world, would not only reconfigure national logistics but would also do so at South American level. However, Cosco is aiming further ahead as it has proposed to the Peruvian Government the creation of a special economic zone, which would facilitate the transition to productive diversification, recognised by the MEF as an imperative objective of our economy. Likewise, we have China Minmetals Corp., owner of Las Bambas and Sinohydro, one of the shareholders of the Amazon Waterway, which limits itself to following our institutional framework in environmental and social matters, a common practice of Chinese companies throughout the world. As a result, the former is facing serious social and economic conflicts, while the latter had to withdraw its Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) from the review process after serious questioning even by the State itself. And now, we have just heard about China CAMC Engineering CO. LTD and China Civil Engineering Construction Corp, LTD and China Civil Engineering Construction Corp., in consortium with an unknown and inexperienced Peruvian company, but apparently well-contacted for the construction of various road infrastructure projects, for which possible acts of corruption are being investigated.... In fact, the report with complaints and recommendations made by the Coordinating Body of Indigenous Organisations of the Amazon Basin - COICA - on environmental and social impacts in the countries of the Amazon Basin, presented in the framework of the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) to which China was submitted to the United Nations Human Rights Council in 2018, bears witness to this...