Ron DeSantis will meet the UK foreign secretary and dozens of business leaders in London on Friday as the Florida governor burnishes his foreign policy credentials ahead of an expected battle with Donald Trump for the Republican party’s presidential nomination.

DeSantis’s visit to Britain marks the end of a whirlwind tour of four countries as part of an international trade mission, officially billed as an effort to drum up foreign direct investment in Florida.

Earlier in the week, he travelled to Tokyo, Seoul and Jerusalem. He held talks with Japanese prime minister Fumio Kishida, and met Benjamin Netanyahu in Israel, which he hailed as “one of the most valued and trusted” allies of the US.

The events have been an opportunity for DeSantis, 44, to present himself as a statesman. Dan Eberhart, a former Trump donor who is now backing DeSantis, said the trip was “laying the foundation” for the governor to “discuss his foreign policy experience and ideas on the debate stage”.

On the London leg of his tour, DeSantis is expected to meet James Cleverly, the UK foreign secretary, as well as address a group of 50 business leaders at a private roundtable discussion with Kemi Badenoch, UK trade secretary.

The meeting with business leaders will take place at Lloyd’s of London, and be hosted by the chair of the insurance market, Bruce Carnegie-Brown, according to one person familiar with the planning.

DeSantis is not expected, however, to hold talks with Rishi Sunak, the prime minister, who has had several meetings with Biden in recent months, or with rightwing populist leaders in the UK who say they admire the governor’s political style.

Nigel Farage, an ally of Trump and former leader of the defunct Brexit party, said he had met DeSantis before and was not expecting to see him in London.

DeSantis gained global attention for his handling of the Covid-19 pandemic, and his political stock rose after last year’s US midterm elections, when he secured re-election by nearly 20 points while Republicans across the country faltered.

More recently, however, a series of mis-steps and aggressive policy decisions — including a law that would ban most abortions in Florida after six weeks — have raised doubts among elected officials and deep-pocketed donors over DeSantis’s ability to take on Trump.

Many establishment Republicans took issue with DeSantis’s stance on the war in Ukraine, which he described as a “territorial dispute” that was not in America’s “vital national interests”.

Although DeSantis later rowed back the comments, during his tour this week he told Nikkei in Tokyo that a ceasefire was “in everybody’s best interest”, a position that puts him at odds with many Republicans and Democrats alike.

Trump remains the frontrunner in an increasingly crowded field of Republicans looking to challenge Joe Biden, with his standing among the party’s grassroots improving despite an indictment on criminal charges in New York earlier this month.

The latest average of public opinion polls, compiled by Real Clear Politics, shows just over half of Republicans favour Trump as the party’s 2024 nominee, while 22.5 per cent prefer DeSantis.

DeSantis is also under pressure at home in his long-running spat with Disney. On Wednesday, the media company sued the governor, claiming the state’s “retaliation” for its stance on the “Don’t Say Gay” law violated the company’s constitutional rights.

The governor is expected to formally launch a presidential campaign in the coming weeks, after the conclusion of the legislative session in Florida.