“HARD INFRASTRUCTURE IS WHAT WE NEED TO GET OUT OF POVERTY.”

Watch the video interview below with Olawale A-Rasheed, CEO of Abuja, Nigeria-based African Railway Consulting Ltd, who provides an excellent discussion of Africa’s needs for massive railroad construction.

The Silent Revolution in African Rail

2 June 2021

In this new podcast of the Belt and Road Institute in Sweden (BRIX), host Hussein Askary discusses with our guest Olawale A-Rasheed, CEO of Abuja, Nigeria-based African Railway Consulting Ltd, the current situation and future plans for railway connectivity in the African continent. We try to answer the following questions: – What is the status of transport sector in Africa, West Africa, and Nigeria? – What projects are completed, under construction? Who is building them? – What are the plans to develop this sector? Trans-African High-speed rail? – What is the role of China and the BRI in this process, and what can the U.S. and Europe contribute to it? Why they should learn from China in focusing on building the hard infrastructure in Africa? – There are many initiatives proposed by the U.S., the UK, and the EU to “rival” the BRI and China in Africa. Are these realistic? Wouldn’t it be better if the West and China join hands with Africa to reach the development goals? Mr. Rasheed is also the Director of the African Rail Roundtable and editor of the specialized magazine Rail Business (http://railbus.com.ng/)

“The real friends of Africa now are those trying to bridge the infrastructure deficit…..China has done it. It has pumped billions of dollars into the Belt and Road Initiative. Now, whatever critisism they have on that initiative, it has helped Africa. It has opened up Africa and it has challenged the world, that to be a friend of Africa, come and help us to build roads, bridges, have vision, high cities, power, and all those. So it is a clarion call to all friends of Africa in the West, East, Asia that HARD INFRASTRUCTURE IS WHAT WE NEED TO GET OUT OF POVERTY.”

Lawrence Freeman is a Political-Economic Analyst for Africa, who has been involved in economic development policies for Africa for over 30 years. He is the creator of the blog: lawrencefreemanafricaandtheworld.com. Mr. Freeman’s stated personal mission is; to eliminate poverty and hunger in Africa by applying the scientific economic principles of Alexander Hamilton

Rwanda Moves Forward With Nuclear Energy: Time for Africa To Go Nuclear!

October 23, 2019

A nuclear plant. FILE PHOTO | AFP
A nuclear plant. Russia’s nuclear agency Rosatom has signed co-operation agreements to set up the nuclear plants in Rwanda, Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania. FILE PHOTO | AFP

Nuclear power is essential to meet the needs of Africa’s huge energy deficit. However, it will do more for Africa. Nuclear energy not only has a higher energy flux density than hydro, coal, gas, inefficient solar, and silly wind mills, but it embodies a higher level of technology. This will enable African nations to raise the skill level of their workforce, as they learn to build an operate a more technologically advanced energy platform. More engineering schools and training centers will be required as African nations enter the age of civilian nuclear power. Thus, the nuclear energy industry will serve as a science driver for society, while creating higher levels of economic growth. 

Read: Rwanda Approves Nuclear Power Deal With Russia

Excerpts below:

The Rwandan Cabinet has approved an agreement with Russia to advance the use of nuclear energy for “peaceful purposes,” a move that is expected to bolster relations between the two countries and advance the latter’s interests in the region.

This comes ahead of the first Russia-African Forum next week in the city of Sochi, which President Paul Kagame has confirmed attendance, accompanied by a delegation of senior government officials.

The nuclear power deal was first signed in Moscow last December and will see Russian scientists set up a Centre for Nuclear Science and Technology in Kigali.

The deal was boosted in May when a Russian government nuclear parastatal, Rosatom Global, reached an agreement to set up the nuclear plant by 2024—that the government says will help in the advancement of technology in agriculture, energy production and environment protection.

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Nuclear Power at Russia-Africa Forum

The Russia-Africa Economic Forum in Sochi will host a special panel discussion, “Contribution of Nuclear Technologies in the Development of Africa,” on October 23, with the participation of Alexey Likhachev, Director General of Rosatom-the State Nuclear Energy Corporation.

“Rosatom has been active in Africa for a long time. The creation and development of the nuclear industry in Africa will not only solve the problem of the energy crisis, but also change the standard of living, providing full access to public health services, increasing the level of education and food security. We see a great interest on the part of African countries in creating new ties for further technological development. Moreover, we are ready to discuss all possible options for cooperation on the continent. I am sure that Russian-African nuclear projects will have a great future,” said Likhachev on Oct. 15, in a preview of the Sochi event.

The forum in Sochi was also prepared by a conference in Nairobi last week that featured officials of Rosatom and over 150 energy and nuclear professionals from across the globe. Representatives from key African countries that are planning or already implementing their respective programs for developing peaceful nuclear technologies included Côte d’Ivoire, Egypt, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Niger, Nigeria, Rwanda, South Africa, Sudan, Tanzania, Tunisia, Uganda, and Zambia.

Speaking in Nairobi, Dmitry Shornikov, CEO of Rosatom Central and Southern Africa, emphasized the advantages of joining the atomic club through creating nuclear industries in newcomer countries, and gave an overview of projects with the maximum positive effect on industrial development, enhancing the quality of life and developing ‘knowledge economy’.

Russia’s Growing Involvement in African Nuclear Development

One of the questions of the Oct. 23-24 Russia-Africa Summit is the need for Africa to develop civilian nuclear power. Russia is at the front end of the strategy to equip Africa with nuclear power, reports Sébastien Périmony in his blog “Africa with the Eyes of the Future” in France. No fewer than eight African countries have already signed agreements with Russia’s nuclear power company, Rosatom: Sudan, Kenya, Uganda, Nigeria, Rwanda, Zambia, Zimbabwe, and Ghana.

“The stark reality is that Africa is in dire need of energy: 48 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa produce as much energy as the single country of Spain produces in Europe. That means that every other African has no access to electricity. According to the Global Energy Architecture Performance Index Report 2017, only five African countries have 100% electrification, all of them in  North Africa: Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Tunisia, and Morocco. South Africa follows immediately after, with a rate of 85.40%. Then come Ghana, 64.06%; Senegal, 56.50%; Ivory Coast, 55.80; and Nigeria, 55.60%. Some francophone countries: World Bank Reports gives access to electricity as 16% for Niger, 9% for Chad, 14% for the Central African Republic, and 20% for Burkina Fasso.”

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Read: Time to Invest in Nuclear Energy in Africa

Excerpts below:

“The future of energy and base-load generation is in nuclear, and probably coal and liquefied natural gas. Kenya needs to push ahead with the nuclear agenda to meet the country’s energy needs,” said the managing director of Kenya Nuclear Electricity Board Collins Juma.

Mr Juma said that Kenya requires at least 18,000MW to become a middle-income and an industrialized nation. With the total installed capacity at 2,370MW, it will need to diversify its energy sources to reach that target.

Countries in East Africa are among those on the continent seeking to build nuclear power plants driven by the need to end power challenges, and accelerate industrial and economic growth.

Russia, China and South Korea have emerged as the key vendors of nuclear energy, offering to help in financing the deals.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has been at the forefront of the campaign to sell nuclear to Africa. Its deputy director-general Mikhail Chudakov told The EastAfrican that nuclear energy holds the key to industrial development.

“Africa needs to understand that solar and wind are good for home lighting [but not manufacturing],” he said.

Massive investments

But nuclear energy needs massive resources to build and operate, so state-owned companies like Russia’s Rosatom, China General Nuclear, China National Nuclear Corporation and Korea Electric Power Corporation are pushing various financing and construction models for the continent’s customers.

The companies have signed agreements and memoranda with African countries, ranging from research and development and human resources development to full reactor projects. Russia and China, in particular, have crafted packages providing state-backed loans, in the process altering the dynamics of nuclear markets.

In Egypt, for instance, Russia is providing 85 per cent of the funding for the 4,800MW plant currently under construction at a cost of $21 billion.

 

In Africa, the Belt and Road Is Generally Spurring Socio-EconomicDevelopment

Lamu Port-South Sudan-Ethiopia-Transport (LAPSSET) Corridor project, also known as Lamu corridor is a transport and infrastructure project in Kenya that, when complete, will be the country’s second transport corridor

May 12, 2019

The Belt and Road strategy of international cooperation already up and running and phenomenally redrawing the global development map. With outlaying economic corridors and tremendous added value it is also putting Africa in the front-line of emerging global economic hubs, wrote Charles Onunaiju, Director Center for China Studies, Utako, Abuja, in his article, “Africa and China’s Belt and Road Strategy,” that appeared in {The Sun} of Nigeria on May 8.

Elaborating the contribution of the Belt and Road Initiative in Africa, Onunaiju wrote: “Since the action plan of the Belt and Road strategy was rolled out, key infrastructure projects have sprung up in Africa taking shape from its concessional funding support and inspirations of facility connectivity. In respect of overland construction, Chinese companies through concessional financial support have built the Addis Ababa-Djibouti Railway in Ethiopia, which is the first electrified railway in Africa, the Mombasa-Nairobi Railway in Kenya, the Abuja-Kaduna Railway in Nigeria, Benguela railway in Angola, and many others, including the Lagos-Ibadan-Kano-Abuja [railroad] under construction.

“With regards to the maritime component of Belt and Road Initiative, Africa features eminently in the key infrastructure projects. So far, Chinese companies have constructed the port of Bagamoyo in Tanzania, the No. 19 berth of the port of Mombasa and three berths of port Lamu, all in Kenya, the New port of Pointe-Noire in the Republic of Congo or Congo Brazzaville, the Lekki Deep Seaport in Nigeria, the Kribi Deep seaport in Cameroon, and the port of Tamatave in Madagascar.

“Under the framework of the Belt and Road strategy of international cooperation, the port of Cherchell in Algeria has been built and is in operation, while the Port of Luanda in Angola is under construction. The distinct feature of each of these ports is that they either have access to major road connections or sit near the sites of industrial parks, thereby having significant impacts on economic development of the coastal areas of Africa.”

Read the entire article below.

Africa and China’s Belt and Road strategy

China’s Belt & Road New Paradigm for Development: United States Should Join

April 18, 2019

Belt and Road Creates New Asian Paradigm for Global Economic Integration and Inclusiveness

That is the headline on an April 15 {Global Times} op-ed by Toumert Al, the director of Education, International Bachelor Program at the International School under the China Foreign Affairs University. The article provides a tour d’horizon of BRI achievements to date in infrastructure projects on various continents.

“In South Asia, the Belt and Road Initiative is seen as a main driver for infrastructure construction in a region that must bridge the ever-growing gap between its economic potential and the realities of its insufficient infrastructure. According to the World Bank, South Asia requires about 2 trillion dollars of investment in infrastructure construction from 2011 to 2020 if the region wants to be part of the new economic order shaping the future.” The article then discusses a couple of key projects, such as the Padma bridge in Bangladesh and Gwadar port in Pakistan.

Nigeria’s Mambilla Hydro-Electric Dam-3,000 megawatts (courtesy nigerianmuse.com)

“True to its global status and inclusive nature, the BRI is not merely a regional initiative. Africa can be considered a major beneficiary of  China’s economic drive to support the continent’s development and to help its infrastructure and economy achieve targeted growth plans. The year 2018 could be considered the turning point for the BRI in Africa as the signing of the MOU of cooperation between China and 37 African countries and the African Union raised the initiative to a new level. Infrastructure financing provided by China to Africa averaged $11.5 billion between 2012 and 2016.” Examples cited include the $5.8 billion Mambila Hydropower Plant in Nigeria, the Addis Ababa-Djibouti railway, the $11 billion port in Bagamoyo, Tanzania now under construction, and the Nairobi-Mombasa railway project. “Another project that is moving forward and may have the same implications as CPEC (China Pakistan Economic Corridor) has in South Asia is the Suez Canal corridor in Egypt,” the Toumert wrote. In short, the BRI “is a truly new paradigm in international cooperation.”

The Belt and Road Initiative Keeps Growing

China is now engaged in heavy organizing in the countdown to the April 26-27 Second Belt and Road Forum in Beijing, which will bring together representatives of over 100 countries and 29 international organizations. Just how powerful a draw the BRI is to nations across the planet, was shown earlier this week when the tiny Caribbean nation of Jamaica announced that they had signed an MOU with China on the BRI –notwithstanding the withering pressure that Washington and London have brought to bear. A similar, if strategically weightier example of this process was Italy’s signing an MOU with visiting Chinese President Xi Jinping last month.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Lu Kang yesterday discussed China’s approach to the upcoming Forum: “While the BRI was proposed by China, it has grown into an international public good. The success of the first BRF together with the bumper practical outcomes speaks volumes. The fact that more countries and international organizations are taking an active part in the second forum is further proof to its success.”

Asked about media accounts that India would not be sending a delegation–as they hadn’t to the First Belt and Road Forum–because they view the BRI’s China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) as infringing on Indian sovereignty, Lu responded:

“I would like to reiterate that the BRI is an open and inclusive initiative for economic cooperation. It never concerns territorial disputes. In pursuing BRI cooperation, China and partner countries are committed to equality, openness and transparency, to business operations centered around enterprises and to market rules and international norms. For those with inaccurate judgment on the BRI based on misunderstandings due to lack of knowledge of the real situation, I would like to reassure them that China is sincerely and resolutely committed to the principle of consultation and cooperation for shared benefit, equality and mutual benefit. Since its initiation, the Belt and Road cooperation has been inclusive and open to all countries that are interested in joining and working for win-win cooperation. It excludes no one. If the relevant country would like to take some time to see, we can wait.”

Meanwhile, Xinhua interviewed Cambodia’s Information Minister Khieu Kanharith who said that “the BRI forum will also further promote cooperation between China and ASEAN and between China and Cambodia…. For Cambodia, with Chinese assistance, we can build mega-infrastructure projects, and those projects are crucial to boosting economic growth and making communication easier and faster…. Our first priority is to boost economic growth and to make everybody have a fair share of the economic growth, The BRI can help us through sup-porting infrastructure projects and human resources development.”

He continued: “China has assisted us on equal footing, meaning that although China is a big country and Cambodia is a small country, China always treats us equally. With Chinese support, Cambodia has gained confidence in ourselves and our people are proud and confident in rebuilding the country.”

Chinese Insist the U.S. Should Join the Belt and Road

Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank President Jin Liqun told last weekend’s Harvard China Forum that the “infrastructure bottlenecks are the sewage problems of development. I would say that that’s also a problem for the United States”–a statement Americans can agree with. He presented the Belt and Road Initiative as “a platform for all participating countries to work together, including on connectivity,” which he called a matter not only of regional development, but also of “world peace and prosperity.”

When a discussion arose on how China had gone from being a debtor nation dependent on foreign development assistance, to one of the largest contributors to the World Bank’s International Development Assistance facility today, Jin pointedly commented that how much money a country has is not the issue.

“Accumulated wealth cannot buy you respect unless you help do good things for the rest of the world. So China has been trying to invest and help other countries through its own experience,” Jin stated.

At a Center for China and Globalization conference in Beijing over the same weekend, Jin Xin, director of the China Center for Contemporary World Studies of the Communist Party’s International Liaison Department, took on the arguments of former U.S. Ambassador Terry Miller (from the G.W. Bush days), who asserted the U.S. had no interest in participating in the Belt and Road Initiative, which is viewed as “a Chinese show” that “doesn’t have much to do with us.” Jin Xin countered that the U.S. should work with China in third-country markets under the BRI. If it decides not to do so, the U.S. will again find itself “excluded,” just as it excluded itself from the AIIB, in which more than 90 countries are now members, Jin said.

African Union Affirms High Speed Rail For Africa Moving Forward

FILE - A train conductor walks inside a carriage as passengers ride inside a Nairobi Commuter Rail Service train from the Mutindwa station in Nairobi, Kenya, Nov. 12, 2018.
FILE – A train conductor walks inside a carriage as passengers ride inside a Nairobi Commuter Rail Service train from the Mutindwa station in Nairobi, Kenya, Nov. 12, 2018 

“Plans are on track for a high-speed rail network connecting the continent’s borders by 2063, the African Union’s Development Agency says. The ambitious multi-billion-dollar project aims to ease the movement of goods and people across African borders, but the AU warns that corruption could derail that goal.Road, rail, and air traffic connections are so poor between some African countries that it is better to transit through Europe than to travel directly between neighbors.

Intra-African trade is less than 15% of total trade, says Adama Deen, the head of infrastructure at the AU’s Development Agency.

“You cannot have integration without connectivity, whether it is road or rail connectivity, especially when we are talking about the Africa Continental Free Trade Area, where you need a single market and connectivity to move goods, persons within the market,” Deen said

READ: African Union High Speed Rail Network On Track

 

Final Call: IMF and World Bank real culprits in Africa’s debt crisis

This article debunks the myth of China colonizing Africa through a “debt trap” policy. It also has quotes from me on this subject. You can read more comments from me with this link to my post: A Brief Response: Marshall Plan for Africa or “Debt Trap?”

africa_watch_logo_18.jpg

FINAL CALL: IMF-and-World-Bank-real-culprits-in-Africa-debt-crisis.

BY JEHRON MUHAMMAD |  SEP 12, 2018 

Many Western press outlets, including CNN, have repeated a recent claim presented to the U.S. State Department that the “Chinese government is leveraging billions of dollars in debt to gain political leverage with developing countries.”

The phrase they use to accuse China is “debt book diplomacy,” a play on the past usage of the term “gunboat diplomacy” about U.S. policy. They accuse China of miring Africa in debt and “undercutting their sovereignty.”

rwanda_kagame_china_xi-jinping.jpg

Chinese President Xi Jinping (R) meets with African Union Chair Paul Kagame who is President of Rwanda at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, capital of China, Sept. 4, 2018. (Xinhua/Ju Peng)

Not to be outdone, ABC News chimed in: “China’s commercial presence in Africa has prompted complaints in some countries that the continent gets too little from the relationship. Africa is a major target of Beijing’s ‘Belt and Road’ initiative to build ports, highways and other trade-related infrastructure, but some critics in Tanzania, Kenya and other countries say they leave hosts with too much debt.”Pushing back, China claims to be helping African development, not piling up debt, one top China government official said.

“If we take a closer look at these African countries that are heavily in debt, China is not their main creditor,” its special envoy for Africa Xu Jinghy said, during a news conference. “It’s senseless and baseless to shift the blame onto China for debt problems.”

Claims that China is an “economic predator” in Africa, pillaging natural resources and dragging it into debt crisis are “as false as they are sensational,” the Xinhua official Chinese news agency said in a commentary.

According to African economic and political analyst Lawrence Freeman, “It is more than ironic that the West is complaining about Africa’s debt to China. Since the 1960s, Western nations, the IMF, World Bank, Paris Club, etc., have ‘looted’ Africa of hundreds of billions of dollars in bloated debt payments and through the manipulation of currencies, and terms of trade.

Of note is the fact that the anti- China accusation is fairly recent. An April 18 Financial Times article, headlined “African nations slipping into new debt crises,” did not mention China one time as the source of the continent’s debt crisis.

In fact the FT’s piece is critical of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank. “The increase in debt should have raised all sorts of flags and triggered triage, but it didn’t. Neither the International Monetary Fund nor the World Bank sounded the alarm,” the London-based financial paper reported.

In addition, the FT claimed some African countries were hit because “they borrowed in foreign currencies and were finding debt hard to finance after a significant depreciation.”

In 2017 Quartz Africa reported, again not mentioning China, that “African eurobond debt is growing to risky levels.” A eurobond, also referred to as sovereign bond, is a debt security issued by a national government and is denominated in a foreign currency, usually dollars, rather than the euro that its name implies.

This debt crises have been cyclical. Africa’s debt of the 1980s mushroomed to $270 billion and had many factors, according to Quartz, “depending on which side of the fence you’re on.”

Those events came full circle. Even though Quartz recognized the repeating “hallmarks” of unchecked corruption, poor governance, and political mileage investment, the “single catalytic factor to trigger debt unsustainability in Africa has always been the crash of commodity prices on the global market.”

The news service Reuters reported in May of 2017 that “most sub-Saharan African countries still rely on U.S. dollar-denominated debt to finance their economies. Some investors say this is sowing the seeds of future debt crises if local currencies devalue and make dollar debt repayments more expensive.”

The United Nations trade body UNCTAD estimates that Africa’s external debt rapidly grew to $443 billion by 2013 through bilateral borrowing, syndicated loans and bonds. But since then sharp currency devaluations across the continent have pushed up the cost of servicing this debt pile, which continues to grow, the agency said.

It’s no wonder over 50 African heads of state attended the Sept. 3-4 Forum on China-African Cooperation (FOCAC) in Beijing. During the forum China president Xi Jinping announced a hefty $60 billion package to compliment another $60 billion pledged at the 2015 summit.

This breaks down, according to press reports, to $15 billion in grants and interest free loans, $20 billion in credit lines, a $10 billion fund for development financing, $5 billion to finance imports from Africa and waving the debt of the poorest African nations diplomatically linked to China.

On top of President Jinping letting the numbers speak for themselves he had words for China’s detractors: “Only the people of China and Africa have the right to comment on whether China-Africa cooperation is doing well … . No one should deny the significant achievement of China-Africa cooperation based on their assumptions and speculations.”

The African Union chairman, Rwandan President Paul Kagame, has been heard to call Chinese aid and investment strategy in Africa “deeply transformational” and respectful of the continent’s global position.

He said FOCAC had grown into a powerful engine “of cooperation fully aligned with Africa’s Agenda 2063 and sustainable development goals.”

“Our growing ties with China do not come at anyone’s expense. The gains are enjoyed by all who do business with us. Building the capacity of African institutions to transact and monitor more effectively is what will make the biggest difference,” he said.

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Africa Will Be the Breadbasket of the World With Investment in Physical Infrastructure

Africa Should be the Breadbasket of the World, Says the African Development Bank President

Aug. 9, 2018–Addressing the 2018 Agricultural and Applied Economics Association Annual Meeting in Washington attended by over 1,600 agricultural and applied economists from around the world, African Development Bank (AfDB) President Akinwumi Adesina said Aug. 5 that Africa should be the breadbasket of the world, and questioned why Africa should be spending $35 billion a year importing food.

“All it needs to do is harness the available technologies with the right policies, and rapidly raise agricultural  productivity and incomes for farmers, and assure lower food prices for consumers,” Adesina said, according to the AfDB website. “Technologies to achieve Africa’s green revolution exist, but are mostly just sitting on the shelves. The challenge is a lack of supportive policies to ensure that they are scaled up to reach millions of farmers,” he stated, not referring to phony “green” environmentalism, but the green revolution that raises productivity and would make Africa food secure.

Adesina, who was the 2017 World Food Prize winner, is advocating the creation of staple crops processing zones across Africa (SCPZs): vast areas within rural areas, set aside and managed for agribusiness and food manufacturing industries and other agro-allied industries, enabled with the right policies and infrastructure. “I am convinced that just like industrial parks helped China, so will the SCPZs help to create new economic zones in rural areas that will help lift hundreds of millions out of poverty through the transformation of agriculture–the main source of their livelihoods–from a way of life into a viable, profitable business that will unleash new sources of wealth,” he said.

Uganda’s President Yoweri Museveni, in Tanzania, Calls for Investment in Infrastructure Development

Aug. 9, 2018–Uganda’s President Yoweri Museveni, who arrived in Tanzania today on a one-day trip to discuss regional matters with President John Magufuli, said he requested the meeting to brief Magufuli on the outcome of the July 25-27 BRICS Summit in South Africa, during which Museveni made a case for the BRICS countries to invest in the East Africa Community (EAC) which provides high returns on their investments, higher than Europe,  Latin America and Asia. He said: “Investment in infrastructure development is key, especially in roads, railway and electricity. The Chinese have already helped us construct two hydropower dams, in Karuma, which is 600MW, and Isimba 183MW,” the {Kampala Post} reported today. Museveni attended the BRICS summit as rotating head of the EAC this year.

Uganda is a significant beneficiary of Chinese investments in East Africa. China has extended its hand of investment to many African countries, and continues to do so to uplift their economies. Liaoshen Industrial Park and Mbale Industrial Park in Uganda, launched last March, are set to increase local employment. The Chinese investors will offer training to the Ugandans who will work there. Among other spin-offs could be increase trade between Uganda and China.

Development Leapfrogs in Africa Due to Chinese BRI Investment

Aug. 8, 2018 — In an Aug. 7 op-ed to China Global Television Network, He Wenping, senior research fellow at the Charhar Institute, depicts the dramatic changes she’s seen in Africa after a visit to Djibouti earlier this month.

Prof He states the “two wings” of China-Africa industrial capacity cooperation; infrastructure construction and industrial park construction, have been booming on the African continent. This includes the Nairobi-Mombasa railroad and the Djibouti-Addis Ababa Railroad [see slugs in this briefing], as well as rail lines in Angola and Nigeria. In addition there are over 100 Sino-African industrial parks either in operation or under construction.

“Wherever you go, you can see an upsurge in infrastructure construction in Djibouti and a huge presence of China,” He writes. “For example, the largest free trade zone in Africa, jointly managed by Chinese enterprises and local entities, began construction in early July; the already completed Addis Ababa-Djibouti Railway; the port built by China Merchants Group; and the thousands of economic housing projects built with the of Djibouti President Ismail Omar Guelleh when he visited China in November last year. “The Westerners have been around for more
than 100 years but our country is still so poor, and the Chinese came to our country only three years ago but we have already seen great changes and hope,” President Guelleh said.

By the end of 2017, the stock of Chinese investment in Africa had exceeded $100 billion and more than 3,500 Chinese enterprises had invested and operated on the continent.  He points to the example of Dongguan Huajian Group’s investment in a shoe factory in Ethiopia. The Huajian Group has created 7,500 local jobs in Ethiopia, and the Huajian (Ethiopia) Shoe Factory now produces 5 million pairs of women’s shoes annually.

“The hope for development comes from the new impetus provided by the BRI,” He Wenping writes. “Since the Chinese government proposed the BRI in 2013, the African continent, with its abundant resources, huge market potential and strong infrastructure construction demand, has been actively involved in BRI-related projects.

“And in the process of participation, the continent seized an important opportunity for historical development, in order to achieve leapfrog development and transformation from a pre-industrial to a fully industrialized society.”

Kenya’s Standard Gauge Railway Revolutionizing Transportation

Aug. 8, 2018– Kenya’s new, up-and-running Standard Gauge Railway (SGR) from the Port of Mombasa to the capital, Nairobi, built with major Chinese participation, is already revolutionizing the country’s transportation according to the {Daily Nation} of Kenya.

The railway runs seven trains a day carrying a total of 752 containers from the port to Nairobi. While roughly 1,300 containers arrive at the port daily, the time necessary for a ship to clear the port has been reduced from 12 days to just a day and half! This has created a quantum leap in the potential throughput the port, without having to physically expand it. By August, the connection of the SGR line to berths at the port will be complete,  increasing the efficiency even further.

Of course this has led to loss of business and employment at the container freight stations (CFS) where the containers were broken down and transferred to trucks. In answer to this problem Transport Principal Secretary Paul Maringa said that SGR has brought more gains to the economy, ensured efficiency at the Mombasa port and saved roads from overloaded trucks.  “We cannot continue having the conversation about Mombasa and Nairobi. We must look at the bigger picture. We are encouraging the CFS owners to come and open their stations in Nairobi and other parts of the country,” Maringa told the {Daily Nation} by phone.  Asked whether players in the sector should concentrate on investing in Nairobi, Maringa said, “We should not lose the direction. Let’s look at things holistically. We have been able to attract more business at the port which is benefitting Mombasa and the country at large,” he said.  “And this is because of the speed that the SGR has been able to transport cargo to the inland container depot in Nairobi compared to the trucks. We have added handling capacity at the port and that is beneficial to all of us,” he said, stating that the port has handle at least 17,000 containers.

Furthermore the SGR has enabled the government to save money for other development projects.  “The accidents cases have also gone down. Those are the silent benefits of the project as Kenyans’ lives are more important than the businesses we are doing,” he said.

Ethiopia Railway on the Road to Self-Management

Aug. 8, 2018–China is now training Ethiopians to independently run the new standard gauge railway line between Djibouti and Addis Ababa. As of now the locomotive drivers, the management, and many of technicians are still Chinese.  While teams of Ethiopians and Djiboutians have been undergoing training in China, the Chinese and Ethiopian governments are cooperating in building an Ethiopian railway academy.

The Chinese Embassy Economic and Commercial Counselor Liu Yu told the {Ethiopian Herald}, “The Ethiopia railway academy is already under design in Bishoftu. The government has donated $60 million for the  construction. Ethiopia and China have been enjoying strong relationship and cooperating in different areas, one of which is human capacity building takes the epicenter.”

The Ethiopia-Djibouti Railway Share Company (EDRSC) Director General Tilahun Sarka stressed that human resource development is the top priority of the corporation, as the railway has been under the management of two Chinese companies, China Railway Group (CREC) and China Civil Engineering Construction Corporation (CCECC).

Pointing to the high quality of the Chinese training, Tilahun said: “The good thing about Chinese instructors and lecturers, as long as you keep on asking questions you will get what you need.”

“Keeping the ration of the EDRSC share, we are engaged in training about 50 Ethiopian and Djiboutian prospective train drivers. These trainees will exchange ideas on topics related to railway operations technologies and railway management, that could realize and create a competent and skilled labor force to operate the Chinese-built and financed 756 km Ethiopia-Djibouti electrified rail line,” he stated.

One trainee, Eyoba Dubale, told the {Ethiopian Herald}: “The trainers from China are dedicated in assisting us. The training is going well in its schedules and we are happy of the whole process. After the training we will be assistant driver, and after establishing comprehensive skills and knowledge as well as attitude of serving in the system, we will take over charge of the driving responsibility to the service the logistics sector for the common good.”

The EDRSC is part of the five-year growth and transformation plan, which aims to enhance the transportation network within the country by connecting to adjacent countries and ports. The National Railway Network of Ethiopia is believed to provide efficient mobility and improve the export and import activities, boosting the economic development.

Forum on China-Africa Cooperation: Win for Africa’s Development

It’s Time for Africa

Alignment with China’s development vision heralds a new era of opportunity on the continent

By He Wenping- JULY 5, 2018

A Chinese engineer collaborates with Kenyan workers on the construction of the Mombasa-Nairobi Railway on April 9, 2016 (XINHUA)

As agreed by both China and Africa, China will host the Beijing Summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) this September. Wang Yi, Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister, made the announcement on the sidelines of the Meeting of BRICS Ministers of Foreign Affairs in South Africa on June 4.

The upcoming summit will be themed Win-Win Cooperation and Join Hands to Build a Closer Community with a Shared Future for China and Africa. Wang said China and Africa will endeavor to integrate the Belt and Road Initiative, the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development of the UN, the Agenda 2063 of the African Union (AU) and the development strategies of various African nations to create more opportunities for mutually beneficial cooperation, and to open up new prospects for common development.

The First FOCAC Summit was held in Beijing in 2006, and 12 years on leaders from China and Africa will once again gather in Beijing to usher in a new era of Sino-African cooperation. This summit, the third in FOCAC’s 18-year history, demonstrates the value that China places on Sino-African ties and promises to drive the China-Africa friendship to new historic heights.

Proactive attitude

Since Chinese President Xi Jinping proposed the Belt and Road Initiative five years ago, more than 100 countries and international organizations around the world have shown interest, of which more than 80 have signed cooperation agreements with China involving Belt and Road projects. The initiative, consisting of the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st-Century Maritime Silk Road, aims to build a trade and infrastructure network connecting Asia with Europe and Africa along and beyond the trade routes of the ancient Silk Road.

Africa is a continent rich in resources with great market potential, but it is in dire need of robust infrastructure. It is proactively participating in Belt and Road construction with other countries along the routes in the hope that its economy can make a leap.

As Wang said when he visited Africa in January, the African continent must be at the heart of the Belt and Road Initiative and must not be left behind by China or the wider world in terms of development.

FOCAC was established in October 2000, 13 years prior to the proposal of the Belt and Road Initiative. China pursues common, intensive, safe, open and green development in its cooperation with African countries, which neatly dovetails with its commitment to innovative, coordinated, green and open development that is for everyone at home. Nearly 18 years of evolution have established FOCAC as a symbol of international cooperation, which allows the organization to provide precious experience to the Belt and Road construction across different regions and fields.

Advancing interconnection

Inadequate infrastructure is a bottleneck that constrains Africa’s economic development. Poor transport facilities and substandard roads have created exorbitant costs in domestic and regional trade, as well as impeding foreign investment.

Financing for Africa’s infrastructure needs faces an annual shortfall of at least $20 billion. In addition, most African countries have a low level of industrialization, and the contribution of industry to their economies is correspondingly small. However, Africa is a continent with abundant resources, low labor costs and great market potential, while China has significant advantages in capital, technology and equipment, as well as a wealth of experience in transforming from an agricultural to an industrial society. At a time when China is undergoing a fundamental phase of economic transition and upgrading, there is plenty of high-quality capacity and advanced equipment and technology available for outward transfer, much of which is ideally suited to Africa’s needs.

Just as the Chinese people harbor the Chinese dream of national rejuvenation, the African people hold the African dream of achieving development and alleviating poverty. Connectivity and industrialization are essential preconditions and the only path toward the realization of this dream. The Belt and Road Initiative can work in harmony with Africa’s development strategy for the 21st century. It can provide new drive for the sustainable development of Sino-African relations and help Africa take a step forward, blazing a new trail for South-South cooperation.

China and the AU signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) on infrastructure construction cooperation on January 27, 2015. According to the MOU, under the strategic framework of Africa’s 2063 Agenda, China will enhance cooperation with African nations on railways, highways, regional airlines and industrialization to promote African integration. Chinese enterprises have already launched construction projects in these fields in countries such as Ethiopia, Djibouti, Kenya and Nigeria.

For example, the Huajian Group, a shoe producer from Dongguan in south China’s Guangdong Province, began operating in the Ethiopia Oriental Industrial Park at the end of 2011. By the end of 2017, Huajian had become the largest private Chinese investor in Ethiopia, generating $122 million of foreign exchange income and creating 7,500 new jobs for the local population. The company produces over 5 million pairs of women’s shoes each year, accounting for more than 65 percent of the Ethiopian shoe industry’s total exports. On September 1, 2017, the Ethiopian Government awarded Zhang Huarong, Chairman of the Board of the Huajian Group, the honorary title of “Father of Ethiopia’s Industry” for his contribution to the country’s development. Inspired by its success in Ethiopia, the Huajian Group plans to invest in Rwanda, Nigeria and elsewhere in Africa in the future.

The China-built Nyerere Bridge, linking the business area of Tanzania’s largest city Dar es Salaam to the Kigamboni district across the Kurasini creek, is the largest cable-stayed cross-sea bridge in sub-Saharan Africa (XINHUA)

Driving force

At the FOCAC Johannesburg Summit in South Africa in December 2015, China and participating African countries agreed to carry out 10 major cooperation plans in the following three years. The ultra-intensive plans, worth around $60 billion, cover industrialization, agricultural modernization, infrastructure construction, finance, green development, trade and investment facilitation, poverty alleviation, public health, people-to-people exchanges, and peace and security. The foremost of these is cooperation on industrialization to promote the progress of African development. In order to facilitate this, the first China-Africa Capacity Cooperation Fund—worth $10 billion—has been set up, alongside the Special Loan for the Development of African Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises and the China-Africa Development Fund each with a capital of $5 billion.

Industrial cooperation between China and Africa has already begun to bear fruit. As one of the first African countries to join China in international industrialization cooperation, Tanzania has signed a framework agreement with China on supporting key projects of the country’s ongoing five-year plan.

The construction of infrastructure and industrial parks is also making rapid progress. China has assisted Africa in building several railway lines, including one connecting the port city of Mombasa in Kenya to its capital Nairobi, another connecting Addis Ababa, the capital of Ethiopia, to Djibouti, and a third connecting Angola and Nigeria.

As Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta said at the opening ceremony of the Mombasa-Nairobi Railway on May 31, 2017, the new line is “one of the cornerstones to Kenya’s journey of transformation to an industrial, prosperous and middle-income country.”

The author is a researcher with the Institute of West Asian and African Studies, the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, and a senior researcher with the Charhar Institute

 

Chinese Economic Engagement in Africa: New Silk Road on the Continent

“The closest look yet at Chinese economic engagement in Africa”

June 2017
The closest look yet at Chinese economic engagement in Africa

Field interviews with more than 1,000 Chinese companies provide new insights into Africa–China business relationships.

In two decades, China has become Africa’s most important economic partner. Across trade, investment, infrastructure financing, and aid, no other country has such depth and breadth of engagement in Africa. Chinese “dragons”—firms of all sizes and sectors—are bringing capital investment, management know-how, and entrepreneurial energy to every corner of the continent. In doing so they are helping to accelerate the progress of Africa’s economies.

Yet to date it has been challenging to understand the true extent of the Africa–China economic relationship due to a paucity of data. Our new report, Dance of the lions and dragons: How are Africa and China engaging, and how will the partnership evolve?, provides a comprehensive, fact-based picture of the Africa–China economic relationship based on a new large-scale data set. This includes on-site interviews with more than 100 senior African business and government leaders, as well as the owners or managers of more than 1,000 Chinese firms spread across eight African countries1that together make up approximately two-thirds of sub-Saharan Africa’s GDP.

Africa’s largest economic partner

In the past two decades, China has catapulted from being a relatively small investor in the continent to becoming Africa’s largest economic partner. And since the turn of the millennium, Africa–China trade has been growing at approximately 20 percent per year. Foreign direct investment has grown even faster over the past decade, with a breakneck annual growth rate of 40 percent.2Yet even this number understates the true picture: we found that China’s financial flows to Africa are around 15 percent larger than official figures when nontraditional flows are included. China is also a large and fast-growing source of aid and the largest source of construction financing; these contributions have supported many of Africa’s most ambitious infrastructure developments in recent years.

We evaluated Africa’s economic partnerships with the rest of the world across five dimensions: trade, investment stock, investment growth, infrastructure financing, and aid. China is among the top four partners for Africa across all these dimensions (Exhibit 1). No other country matches this depth and breadth of engagement.

Africa’s economic partners, including China, India, France, the United States, and Germany, based on goods trade, foreign direct investment, aid, and infrastructure financing

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President Trump’s Fundamentally Flawed Africa Policy

By Lawrence Freeman,

January 4, 2018

After nearly a year in office, the outline of President Donald Trump’s policy for Africa has emerged as fundamentally and seriously flawed. In a similar manner to his predecessors, Presidents Clinton, Bush, and Obama, Trump’s African strategy suffers from a conceptual deficiency in its failure to recognize that the most fundamental human right is the right to life. Every human being is morally entitled to live a healthy, productive, meaningful life with the hope that the future will be an improvement over the present.  If one examines the outlines of policy by President Trump and the State Department, such a guiding and indispensable principle is conspicuously absent. For Africa, where the largest number of people endure the greatest hardships of life of any continent, the absence of a full-throttled U.S. commitment to eliminate poverty and hunger as an essential feature of a strategic policy, is damning, and must be remedied.

To ensure a prosperous future for what will be the most populated continent on the planet in 2050, by which time the population is expected to double, from 1.2 billion to 2.4 billion people, President Trump should emulate China’s infrastructure-led development program.

The Trump administration is expected to reduce State Department and USAID-funded programs, among others, beneficial to Africa. Not to overlook the potential harmful effects of these cuts, there is a more fundamental shortcoming to Trump’s policy. Like his recent predecessors, he is ignorant of, or ideologically blind, to understanding what is required to accelerate economic growth across the African continent. Africa needs, infrastructure, infrastructure, and more infrastructure, particularly in the vital categories of energy, rail, roads, and water management. Trump has been especially eager to support increased military deployments and kinetic warfare against violent extremists in Somalia, the Sahel, and northeast Nigeria. However, any competent and honest military leader knows an effective counter-terrorism effort must include economic development. If the Sahel, were not a barren, underdeveloped desert, the various terrorist militia would not be able so easily to occupy this region for their base of operations.

Security and Free Trade: Inadequate for Africa

The African continent has the greatest deficit in all categories of infrastructure on the planet. Thus, not surprisingly, Africa has the largest number of people living in poverty; living without the basic necessities of life.  According to a 2016 World Bank report on poverty, Sub-Saharan Africa has the largest percentage of people, 41%, living in extreme poverty. That translates into the largest number of poor at 389 million, just over 50% of 767 million worldwide living below the poverty line of $1.90 per person per day. Yet despite all the hype about Africa’s “rising lions,” referring to African nations with high growth rates of GDP, the number of people living in poverty is Sub-Saharan Africa is increasing.

Look at one critical area: access to energy which is the lifeblood of an economy. Abundant grid energy, accessible to all sectors of society, can transform an entire nation and lift its population out of poverty. Conversely, the lack of energy kills. According to “Energy Access Outlook 2017,” of the 674 million people, globally, expected to be without access electricity in 2030, over 600 million, or 90%, will live in Sub-Saharan Africa. For the developing sector nations in Asia and Latin America, the percentage of the population expected to have access to electricity by 2030 is 99% and 95% respectively, while for Sub-Saharan Africa, it expected to be 50% or less.  In Sub-Saharan Africa, the number of those without electricity is increasing, unlike like all other populations in the world. Africa requires a minimum of 1,600 gigawatts of electrical power to have same the standard of living as advanced nations.

In a related classification, cooking energy, the picture is also abysmal. Almost 80% of the people living in Sub-Saharan Africa do not have gas or electric stoves; instead they cook with solid biomass, i.e., solid waste, animal dung, wood, saw dust, wood chips, etc. This is not only destructive to the environment, but to human labor as well. I have witnessed, on numerous occasions in my travels throughout Nigeria, young girls collecting firewood and then carrying it on their heads for sale in the market. In Mali, young men are destroying trees to be used in the primitive method of charcoaling, aiding the expansion of the desert.

President Trump’s Africa policy of security/counter-terrorism first, followed by trade and investment, fails to address Africa’s underlying depressed conditions of life which allow violent groups to easily recruit. People who can’t feed their families or provide the minimal necessities of life, and see no hope in the future, are led to violence out of manipulation and despair. Trade and investment, as proposed by the Trump administration, are not the solution.

Africa suffered greatly from 500 years of slavery and colonialism, 1450-1960. Following the initial success of the independence movements, the financial predators moved in to loot the continent’s vast wealth in natural resources. Extractive industries provide revenue, but they do not add/create wealth or generate a significant number of jobs. Africa doesn’t need more investors intent on making profits under the guise of applying the distorted “laws” of free trade and the marketplace. African nations require real economic growth that creates added value, increases the total wealth of society, and provides productive jobs to the restless masses of unemployed youth.

In 2014, Africa’s share of value added in global manufacturing is reported to be a pitiful 1.6%.  This sorrowful state of economy can and must be reversed. The manufacturing process is vital for every healthy economy. It adds wealth by transforming natural resources into finished and semi-finished products to be either consumed domestically or exported. This requires technologically advanced capital equipment, and skilled labor, all embedded within an integrated platform of infrastructure. State-directed credit and long-term, low-interest loans invested into critical areas of the economy, such as infrastructure, are indispensable for the growth of a manufacturing sector. Witness previous successful periods of economic growth in the U.S. (and in China today); these were accomplished through public credit, not hedge fund speculators and Wall Street day traders.

The most valuable natural resource of Africa, is not its mineral wealth, which is the target of the financial and mining/commodity predators. Rather, its greatest natural resource is its immense quantities of arable, yet to be cultivated land, along with the abundant water sources in its numerous lakes and river systems.  Africa is capable of feeding its people and eliminating hunger. It can also potentially help feed Asia, if properly developed with a manufacturing sector, and food-processing industries, coupled with a massive expansion of infrastructure.

What Does China Know About Africa That the U.S. Doesn’t

Over the last thirty-five years, China has lifted over one-half billion of its citizens out of poverty. This has been accomplished by massive state-directed investment into essential categories of infrastructure, along with its deep commitment to advance its economy through attaining new levels of science and technology. Both Chinese President Xi Jinping and Premier Li Keqiang have publicly stated their desire to help African nations eliminate poverty. This universal mission by the leadership of China, expressed concretely in the “Spirit of the New Silk Road,” has led to a revolution in joint infrastructure projects in Africa. New railroads are being built across the continent, replacing colonial locomotives and tracks built over one hundred years ago. On the East Coast, an entry zone for the Maritime Silk Road, new and expanded ports, with connecting rail lines vectored westward into the interior of the continent, are creating the potential for a fundamental transformation of the economies of several African nations including; Ethiopia, Sudan, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Rwanda, and Djibouti.

The “ChinaPower Project” reports that between 2000 and 2014, China funded 2,390 projects across Africa totaling $121.6 billion, just over one-third of China’s total global financing. In Africa, 32% of the financing went for transportation projects and 28.5% for energy.

“Dance of the lions and dragons” a study completed by McKinsey & Company in 2017, analyzed privately owned Chinese companies operating in Africa. They estimated that there are 10,000 such private Chinese businesses that have committed $21 billion to infrastructure, which is more than combined total of the African Development Bank, European Commission, World Bank, International Finance Corporation, and the G-8 nations. And 31% of these companies are involved in manufacturing which accounts for 12% of Africa’s industrial production—valued at $500 billion.

Conclusion

The U.S., along with the other Western powers, virtually abandoned the nations of Africa as soon as they had overthrown their colonial masters. President John F. Kennedy stands out among U.S. presidents, following the death of Franklin Roosevelt, as a champion for the newborn African nations. His collaboration with Ghanaian President Kwame Nkrumah in the early 1960s to construct the Volta Dam Hydro-electric Aluminum Smelting Complex is a singular moment in U.S.-Africa relations over the last six decades.  America lost its vision for development, resulting in its refusal to build the power plants, dams, railroads, and ports that Arica needs. China has made a commitment to Africa and now is contributing to the most expansive building of new infrastructure the continent has ever seen.

President Trump’s recently released National Security Strategy (NSS) is totally hypocritical: it attacks China for becoming Africa’s largest partner, and accuses China of undermining “Africa’s long-term development.” Trump’s NSS expresses the same old British geopolitical mentality of winners and losers competing in a zero-sum war for global hegemony.

Throughout my travels in Africa, I have found expressions of affection for America and its ideals; even among those nations that the U.S. has abused. That positive attitude is beginning to wane. However, it is not too late for the U.S. to chart a new course, one of cooperation with China and Africa to transform the continent.  Saving Lake Chad from extinction and transforming the Lake Chad Basin, is an urgent task for such a tripartite cooperation.