The United States is trying to play catch up with China with respect to trade with Brazil.  A lot of this could have been avoided had we not imposed the tariff on sugar-based ethanol coming from Brazil.  This trip, coming right on the heels of earlier visits this month shows how urgent the Obama Administration thinks improving relations with Brazil is.

Excerpt from the Rio Times Online

U.S. Secretary of State Clinton in Brazil

By Sarah de Sainte Croix, Senior Contributing Reporter

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – U.S. Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, and the U.S. Secretary of the Interior, Ken Salazar, were among the officials in Brazil early this week to continue bilateral talks. Secretary Clinton was previously at the Sixth Summit of the Americas in Colombia from April 13-15th, before traveling to Brasilia April 16-17th to lead the U.S. delegation for the third U.S.-Brazil Global Partnership Dialogue.

U.S. Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, speaking in Brasília, photo by Wilson Dias/ABr.

On April 17th, Secretary Clinton provided opening remarks with Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff at the First Annual High-Level Meeting of the Open Government Partnership (OGP).

Launched on September 20th 2011, the OGP is an international initiative aimed at developing concrete commitments to prevent corruption, promote transparency, and harness new technologies to empower citizens and make government more open and accountable.

The goal of this dialogue is to build upon the agreements the United States and Brazil reached during President Obama’s visit to Brazil in 2011 and President Rousseff’s visit to the United States on April 9th and 10th, 2012.

To read more of this article, go to http://riotimesonline.com/brazil-news/front-page/u-s-secretary-of-state-clinton-in-brazil