All belts are off now in Italy. On Wednesday, Rome officially withdrew from China’s Belt and Road Initiative, Beijing’s signature global infrastructure, trade, and investment scheme.
Flashback: In 2019, Italy – then governed by a strongly euroskeptic coalition– became the only G7 country to officially join BRI. For China, it was a coup to bring aboard Europe’s third-largest and the world’s seventh-largest economy. Rome, for its part, hoped for a bonanza of trade and inbound investment from Beijing.
Spoiler: It didn’t pan out. Italy’s trade deficit with China soared, and debates raged about Chinese access to key Italian firms and infrastructure. Meanwhile, the EU and Italy’s NATO allies saw BRI participation as both a strategic risk and a symbolic blow to Western unity in the face of growing challenges from Beijing.
Italy’s current prime minister, right-winger Giorgia Meloni, sees BRI membership as a mistake but has sought to delicately exit the scheme without angering the world’s second-largest economy. While the Italian government will not renew its BRI agreement when it expires next year, local governments and some companies will continue to work with China under BRI terms.
The timing is telling. Meloni’s move comes on the eve of a big EU-China summit, the first since 2019, where the two sides will seek to manage an increasingly contentious and competitive relationship. (Read our Viewpoint about that here.)