Bilateral exchanges between China and Africa in the new millennium: focus on African countries

Abstract

Due to the gradual and rapid economic development of China over the last thirty years, the country's internal demand for oil has grown exponentially. To meet this need, the Chinese government has diversified his investments, directly in oil companies around the world and indirectly through the countries which have oil reserves. During the last 10 years China has attracted attention for high investments in Africa and Sub-Saharan regions especially for what concern natural resources and local infrastructure development (McKinsey, 2017). To secure its overseas natural resources in several African countries, the Chinese government, over the years, have used their knowledge and know-how of engineering and constructions to invest in the infrastructure markets of the different African countries. From 1963, after Chinese Prime Minister Zhou Enlai first visit in Africa, China started to sign bilateral agreements in order to create a strategy for developing infrastructure and aid in education (Foster, 2009). By the end of 1978 China gave the most notable example of cooperation by financing the construction of the Tanzania-Zambia railway which costs the equivalent of 3$ billions today (McKinsey, 2017). During the second Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOFAC), China's officially declared 2006 China's 'Year of Africa'. In the same year, the Center for Global Development (Center For Global Development, 2006), estimates that Chinese-financed infrastructure projects in Africa amounted to at least US$7.5 billion over the period 2004-5, while a study by Stellenbosch University (Davies, 2008), does document the existence of US$2 billion credit line for Angola alone. Usually these loans are made with an agreement to supply China with tons of barrels of crude per day. This type of accordance is known as the 'Angola Mode'. According to the design of my paper in the first section I will analyze the collaboration between China and Africa since Bandung's conference in 1954, in the second chapter I will discuss the main bilateral exchanges, in the third chapter I will develop the main China's African partners focusing on the "Angola mode" and China's needs of raw materials in the last chapter.