China-Africa cooperation in full swing

In 2016, the year after the Johannesburg Summit and the 6th Ministerial Conference of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC), the Chinese government made considerable headway in its implementation of the Belt and Road Initiative. That year also saw comprehensive expansion and enhancement of China-Africa relations, expedited through stepped up reciprocal visits between state leaders. More frequent China-Africa political interchanges have generated greater interconnectivity and cooperation on industrial capacity, and also facilitated dynamic development of people-to-people and cultural exchanges.

Consolidated Political Mutual Trust

Frequent high-level reciprocal visits have taken place between China and Africa since the Johannesburg Summit. In early 2016, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi followed the diplomatic practice (initiated in 1991) of starting the New Year with a tour of countries on the African continent, and visited Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, and Namibia. Shortly after, in March, Zhang Dejiang, chairman of the Standing Committee of the Chinese National People's Congress (NPC), went to Zambia, Rwanda, and Kenya. In April, Yu Zhengsheng, chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) paid an official goodwill visit to Gabon, Ivory Coast, and Ghana. Wang Yi went to Africa a second time in August to visit Kenya and Uganda, and last November Chinese Vice President Li Yuanchao visited South Africa, Ethiopia, and Djibouti. Several state leaders of African countries, in turn, visited China in 2016, and attended various international and bilateral conferences. Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari came to China in April, Togolese President Faure Gnassingbe in May, and Republic of Congo President Denis Sassou Nguesso in July. In September, Chinese President Xi Jinping met with South African President Jacob Zuma, Senegalese President Macky Sall, Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi, and Chadian President Idriss Deby Itno at the G20 Summit in Hangzhou. In October, Premier Li Keqiang met with Prime Minister of Mozambique Carlos Agostinho do Rosário, who was in China to attend the Forum for Economic and Trade Cooperation between China and Portuguese-Speaking Countries held in Macao. Guinean President Alpha Conde visited China at the end of November, and President of the Republic of Gabon Ali Bongo Ondimba came in early December. Moreover, high-level leaders of African countries, notably South African President Jacob Zuma and Beninese President Patrice Talon, actively participated in the second Investing in Africa Forum convened last September in Guangzhou City.

Also worth mentioning is that China, as host of the 2016 G20 Summit, took the initiative to build a platform and design agendas for the event. The country proposed “support industrialization in Africa and least developed countries” as an important topic for discussion, and was the first to include this task in the G20 Leaders' Communiqué. China thus provided a platform for African countries and G20 members to communicate and conduct exchanges. Besides South Africa, which is a G20 member, China also invited Chad, whose president currently chairs the Assembly of the African Union; Senegal, whose president is the chairperson of the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD); and Egypt, an important country in North Africa, to the G20 Summit. In so doing, China underlined the great importance it attaches to Africa's development, and provided African countries with opportunities to have a say on improvements to global governance.

Deepened Economic Cooperation

Growing mutual political trust between China and Africa has laid firm foundations for the two sides to increase trade and economic cooperation. Over the past year, the China-Africa economic and trade cooperation has been transformed and upgraded. On July 29, the Coordinators' Meeting on the Implementation of the Follow-up Actions of the Johannesburg Summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation was convened in Beijing. The meeting led to the two sides' signing 63 cooperation agreements with a total contract volume of US $18.287 billion, of which direct investment and commercial loans from Chinese enterprises to Africa amounted to US $16.228 billion, accounting for 88.74 percent of the total value. According to incomplete statistics, since the conclusion of the Johannesburg Summit, China and Africa have signed 245 cooperation agreements that involve a total amount of US $50.755 billion. The volume of direct investment and commercial loans from Chinese enterprises to Africa exceeded US $46.553 billion, accounting for 91.73 percent of the total. China's aid to Africa, however, amounted to just 1.07 percent, and its preferential loans to 6.24 percent. This change of structure shows that China-Africa cooperation has undergone a transformation – from government aid to investment and business financing; from merchandise trade to industrial capacity cooperation and processing trade; and from contracting projects to investment and financial cooperation.

Over the past year, China-Africa economic cooperation on the African continent shifted into top gear. On October 5, 2016, the Chinese-built Ethiopia-Djibouti railway linking Addis Ababa, capital of Ethiopia, to the Red Sea port of Djibouti became fully operational. With a total investment of around US $4 billion, it has a total length of 752.7 kilometers. The Ethiopia-Djibouti railway, together with the previously built Abuja-Kaduna railway in Nigeria and the Benguela railway in Angola, in their capacity as main transportation modes, are integral to Africa's burgeoning industrialization, and prime examples of China-Africa cooperation on industrial capacity.

The Ethiopia-Djibouti railway is another cross-border railway that Chinese enterprises have built in Africa since completing the Tanzania-Zambia Railway (TAZARA). The line has slashed the logistic costs of imports and exports and streamlined freight transportation by cutting the travel time between the two countries from seven days to 10 hours. The railway is expected to boost both countries' social, economic, and industrial development, and its inauguration is considered a milestone in African countries' road to industrialization.

Unlike previous projects, Chinese companies involved in the Addis Ababa-Djibouti line will be responsible for the subsequent operational management after its completion in the coming six years as a transition period. During that time, the Chinese company will help to train local technicians and management professionals, so enhancing the technological and management capacity of Ethiopia and Djibouti. This marked China's first exportation of an entire railway industrial chain, covering financing, construction, and operateration.

China can now ensure safe railway operations and generate more economic and social benefits. Meanwhile, better demonstrations and training will be achieved during the six-year transition period through actual operations in Ethiopia and Djibouti which will bring about technological transformations and lay solid foundations for independent railway operations. The railway's construction created more than 3,000 job opportunities for local people, a figure that rose to 16,000 after it began running. These workers are the first in the two countries to be skilled in the operation of modern electrified railways.

The Addis Ababa-Djibouti Railway pattern has drawn attention throughout Africa and the world as a whole. Countries like Uganda, Rwanda, South Sudan, Togo, and Kenya have sent delegations to study the project and accumulate relevant experience and accordingly formulate domestic railway planning.

Over the past year, China has stepped up economic and trade cooperation with Tanzania and Ethiopia. They have signed production capacity cooperation framework agreements and have also confirmed a group of key cooperative projects, including railway renovations, a K3 natural gas power station, and power transmission and transformation from Dares Salaam to Arusha. Of the 64 Chinese enterprises that have entered Ethiopia's Eastern Industrial Park, 31 have started production, with a total investment of US $220 million, creating more than 8,000 job opportunities.

Dynamic People-to-people Exchanges

People-to-people and non-governmental exchanges are effective approaches to consolidating the public and social basis of Sino-African relations, and to guaranteeing their long-term and sustainable development. Telling the Chinese story and intensifying media intercommunication is vital to China-Africa people-to-people and non-governmental exchanges. Since 2014 China has through the China Africa Press Center project invited 1,000 African media workers to the country each year to take part in a 10-month training course. This gives these reporters the opportunity to understand China, improve their news gathering and editing skills, and record personal observations and reflections. In March 2016, 22 African reporters who had taken part in the project attended China's annual National People's Congress and Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference. They were regarded by French media as the journalists the Chinese government most welcomed.

Moreover, since being founded in 2011 the China-Africa Think Tank Forum (CATTF), a major Sino-African non-governmental exchange platform, has been a main vehicle for scholars of the two sides to publicize actual instances of Sino-African cooperation. The fifth CATTF took place in Yiwu of Zhejiang Province in April 2016 and held deep discussions on Sino-African production capacity development and African industrialization. In August 2016, the China-Africa Media & Think-Tanks Symposium was held in the port city of Mombasa, Kenya. More than 150 think tank and media representatives from 20 countries, including China, Kenya, South Africa, Senegal, Tanzania, Nigeria, Morocco, and Egypt, took part, and visited the Mombasa-Nairobi Railway, then under construction.

Constantly enhanced Sino-African political and economic cooperation and people-and-people exchanges have had encouraging impact on fundamental public opinion. China's influence in African countries is rapidly growing, and the overall response to it is positive. According to the well-known Afrobarometer poll held in October 2016, of the 54,000 people interviewed from 36 African countries, the majority thought that China had a positive impact on their country. More than two thirds of interviewees also thought that economic activities, especially investment, were a key element of building and improving China's image among African citizens. Assistance and support from China for the continent's development also won the commendation of more than 80 percent of local residents surveyed from Nigeria, Liberia, and Cameroon, and 91 percent from Mali. Expansion of non-governmental exchanges is indeed a gradual oiling process that brings true transformation.

He Wenping is a research fellow with the Institute of West-Asian and African Studies at Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.