China's Tianjin becomes major production base for Airbus

North China's Tianjin Municipality has become a major production base for European aircraft manufacturer Airbus. 2024 marks the 15th anniversary of the first A320 family aircraft delivered by the Airbus Tianjin Delivery Center, with the total number of deliveries amounting to 763 as of the end of May.

General Manager of the Airbus Tianjin Delivery Center Christoph Schrempp has witnessed the rapid expansion of Airbus' business in Tianjin.

"Indeed, I was a lucky man as I had an opportunity in June 2013 already to make a kind of look-and-see trip to Tianjin and to China. So, that was at that point in time definitely my first contact with Tianjin. It left a quite positive impression and I was very much also impressed by the modern city I found there in Tianjin," said Schrempp.

In September 2008, Airbus' A320 Family Final Assembly Line Asia in Tianjin (FALA Tianjin) was officially put into operation, which is the first civil aircraft final assembly line set up by the company outside Europe. Nine months later, the first A320 family aircraft assembled in Tianjin rolled off the production line and was delivered to its customer.

In September 2017, Schrempp and his team successfully delivered the A330 aircraft to Tianjin Airlines, marking a new milestone for Airbus Tianjin.

In 2021, Airbus and its Chinese partners signed an agreement on expanding and upgrading the production capacity of the FALA Tianjin, enabling the current A320 family assembly facilities to produce A321 aircraft, and in March 2023, the first A321 aircraft was delivered.

Schrempp said he is confident that Airbus' China operation will continue to expand given the fast growth of its business in Tianjin.

"We're going to use to partially replace all the aircraft by the more economical and most advanced A321 family aircraft, for example, but also to grow in terms of having new routes operated. We are also developed our customer base," said Schrempp.

The FALA Tianjin has now become one of Airbus' most important production lines globally, and the company is about to complete the construction of its second production line in Tianjin, further enhancing the assembly capabilities for A320 aircraft.

China's Tianjin becomes major production base for Airbus

The agreement between the U.S. and China to mutually reduce additional tariffs has encouraged Brazil to defend its sovereignty and negotiate for reasonable tariffs, said Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva during his recent state visit to China.

Following a two-day high-level meeting on economic and trade affairs in Geneva, China and the United States announced Monday a series of tariff modification measures aimed at easing trade tensions between the world's two largest economies.

During a press conference on Wednesday in Beijing, Lula voiced his appreciation of the U.S.-China tariff cut, and vowed to pursue reasonable tariffs with the U.S. through negotiation and other means.

"Since the 1980s, globalization has been a keyword, and so is free trade. Suddenly some people believe they have the authority to impose taxes on everyone and everything without consent as if they control the world. However, the reality is that the world is not obligated to accept such actions," said Lula.

"Recently, we've seen a positive shift. The U.S. and China have reached an agreement, resulting in lighter taxes than before. This demonstrates the importance of defending our sovereignty. Brazilian officials know that we hope to negotiate with the U.S., and I urged them to utilize every term in our vocabulary related to 'negotiation'. But if we cannot reach an agreement, we will take reciprocal measures or appeal to the WTO to advocate for our rights. In this way, we will help create a more balanced world and ensure fairer trade among all nations," he said.

Lula paid a state visit to China on May 10-14 at the invitation of Chinese President Xi Jinping.

Brazil encouraged by US-China tariff cut to seek fair tariff negotiations: president