Biden looks to boost trade, energy ties on Brazil visit

US Vice President Joe Biden pressed for increased trade and investment between the Western Hemisphere's two leading economies during talks with Brazilian leaders here Friday. Biden met President Dilma Rousseff on the third day of a visit to Brazil that has also seen him tour the state-run oil giant Petrobras and highlight the importance of the South American giant's vast deepwater oil deposits, discovered in 2007. "We spoke about how to deepen trade and investment in both our countries," Biden, who arrived late Tuesday, said after meeting with Rousseff and his Brazilian counterpart Michel Temer. "Our annual trading relationship has now surpassed $100 billion a year, but there is literally no reason -- no reason why the world's largest and seventh largest economies can't increase that five-fold over time," Biden said. He said the talks notably focused on the oil reserves off Rio de Janeiro, which could hold more than 100 billion barrels of high-quality crude and turn Brazil into a top world exporter, including to the United States. "We also talked about how we could work together on areas that you have far surpassed us. You produce 50 percent of your energy with renewable energy. Our goal is to get to 20 percent by the middle of the next decade. We have a lot to learn from you," the US vice president said. He added that 2013 "can and should mark the beginning of a new era in US-Brazil relations... We have a good deal of work that we have to get done between now and the end of the year to make that promise a reality." "You have significantly increased direct foreign investment in the United States, and we welcome it, and we seek more," Biden noted. Meanwhile Temer said that while Brasilia has built closer ties with African, South American and Arab countries, "we have not withdrawn from a very close relationship with the United States." "We are both very much interested in strengthening these ties, the commercial ties," he added. Temer said his talks with Biden also focused on international issues such as Syria and the Palestine-Israel conflict. "We have both highlighted that there is a strong coincidence in the stands taken by both governments (on these issues)," he added. Biden, who is on a six-day regional tour that earlier took him to Colombia and Trinidad and Tobago, announced Wednesday that Rousseff will make a state visit to Washington in October. On Thursday, the US vice president toured the first Rio de Janeiro slum recovered from drug gangs as part of the city's "pacification" drive ahead of next year's World Cup and the 2016 Summer Olympics. Biden's visit came as Chinese President Xi Jinping was due in oil-rich Trinidad and Tobago Friday at the start of a Latin American and Caribbean tour. Xi plans to also visit Costa Rica and Mexico before a June 7-8 summit with US President Barack Obama. China's trade ties with Latin America have soared in recent years as the world's second biggest economy taps into the region's mineral and oil wealth. In 2009 the Asian giant displaced the United States as Brazil's top trading partner.