The Forum on China-Africa Cooperation takes us back through the history of China-Africa cooperation
By DaDa
Da da da, what news has been drawing relatively high attention lately? Hee hee, of course it is the forum meeting that has attracted global attention. In the promotional video "Building Dreams Together, Sharing a Common Future" for the opening ceremony of the Beijing Summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, we can understand that China and African countries are good brothers and good buddies, linked heart to heart, sharing a common future and common development. While developing its own economy, China is willing to share the fruits of reform and development with African countries, help them make the leap from poverty to prosperity, bring genuine happiness to the African people, and fully give play to China's image as a responsible major country. Below, the editor will give you a detailed interpretation of the course of China-Africa cooperation over these 18 years...
The Forum on China-Africa Cooperation was established in 2000, with the purpose of strengthening China-Africa economic cooperation and trade exchanges. When it was first established, other parts of the world may have found it somewhat difficult to understand. At that time, bilateral trade and investment between China and Africa were very limited, and Africa's prospects were far inferior to what they are now. Thereafter, driven by the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, economic and trade cooperation between the two sides showed explosive growth. Eighteen years later today, China has leapfrogged to become Africa's largest trading partner, and bilateral trade and investment relations have developed rapidly. (Columnist Ni Jierui)
Trade exchanges lay the foundation for China-Africa relations
The African market is becoming increasingly important to China. China has made Africa an important export destination, and Africa also craves affordable and high-quality Chinese products. The total value of China's exports to Africa has climbed from 47 billion USD in 2009 to 106 billion USD in 2015, more than doubling, and has remained stable since 2015. Since 2010, China's exports to Africa have grown by an average of 14% year on year, 5 percentage points higher than the growth of China's exports to other markets. Africa is a vibrant market for China. In fact, of the 15 markets where China's exports have grown fastest, Africa accounts for 10.
In recent years, demand for Chinese products has weakened somewhat in Nigeria and South Africa, the two largest African economies, but the growth of China's exports to other African countries has been enough to offset the related impact. In 2017, China's exports to Nigeria and South Africa also rebounded for the first time since 2015, growing by 17% and 13% year on year respectively. Benefiting from the recovery in demand in Nigeria and South Africa as well as the recovery in global commodity prices, especially metals and oil and gas prices, China's imports from Africa reached 75 billion USD in 2017, up 32% year on year, driving total China-Africa trade to 169 billion USD, up 11.4% year on year.
Uneven development between China and Africa, China-Africa trade deficit widens
Bilateral trade between China and Africa has advanced by leaps and bounds in recent years, but the China-Africa trade deficit has continued to widen since 2015. At present, only 5 African countries have a trade surplus with China. Kenya is a typical example. In 2017, the total value of goods Kenya exported to China was only 166 million USD, but the value of imported goods from China was as high as 5 billion USD, including the steel and equipment China needed to build Kenya's 4 billion USD railway project. According to statistics provided by China's Ministry of Commerce, there are currently more than 3,500 Chinese-funded enterprises in Africa, but this figure may still be lower than the actual situation. For example, according to a recent study by Standard Bank Group in Uganda, it is predicted that there are more than 500 Chinese-funded enterprises locally, equivalent to more than 10 times the official data. These enterprises employ more than 25,000 Ugandan residents in total. By this calculation, the number of Chinese-funded enterprises active across the entire African continent may actually exceed 30,000, most of which are small private enterprises.
Chinese enterprises are now investing in Africa more and more actively. The most common reason is that enterprises hope to enter the huge local consumer market and reduce competition in the increasingly saturated Chinese market. The African market indeed has multiple advantages, including extremely low labor costs, abundant natural resources and production raw materials, a rapidly expanding domestic demand market, and an ideal demographic structure. Although internal conditions on the African continent, such as the current business environment, government efficiency and infrastructure, are still full of challenges, they have clearly improved compared with the 1990s, when Chinese multinational enterprises first entered the African market. In the future, Chinese enterprises' investment in Africa will also become deeper and more successful. (Author: Economist at Standard Bank Group)
In short, the China-Africa path is not only a path of cooperation, but also a path of common development and common prosperity. The future is promising, and we will move forward together!