Agriculture featured prominently at the 2015 Forum on China-Africa Co-operation, but the reality has yet to catch up to the hype about China’s involvement in African agriculture.
It’s easy to dismiss Africa as a place that is, at best, a provider of commodities, land and labour. A closer look shows that the continent is innovative and offers a lot more opportunities.
When it comes to the global political economy, no one “talks left and walks right” more than China, a dominant player in global capitalism. South African and Chinese aspirations have much in common.
For the grand plans unveiled at the China-Africa summit to succeed, Africa will have to cooperate more extensively. The larger and more successful nations need to become sub-regional leaders.
China’s experience indicates that special economic zones can help countries in Africa attract foreign investors, diversify their economies and promote manufacturing.
China’s Confucius Institutes given foreigners a chance to learn more about the country. Africa must be careful that its universities’ partnerships with Confucius Institutes don’t create dependency.
China offers an alternative to traditional donors and investors in low- and middle-income countries. Adding to its appeal is its focus on infrastructure projects.
In China, education is more than a means to deliver high skilled labour. The country has constructed its education policy to demonstrate its ambition to become a global power.
The Africa-China summit will provide an opportunity to get a feel for how Chinese President Xi Jinping is responding to democratic developments in Africa.
There is a new potential coloniser on South Africa’s linguistic block. From 2016, Mandarin will be taught in schools – and this will see African languages bumped even further down the pecking order.
The drug partly responsible for more than halving the rate of malaria over the last 30 years and which won this year’s Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine has a long history of use.
The Sudanese government and its armed opposition are both unhappy with the ceasefire they signed. Senior military officers have also publicly voiced their disapproval of the induced deal.
Over the past 60 years, China has experimented extensively with policies and programmes to encourage the growth of rural enterprises. Africa could do well by following in these footsteps.
Contrary to Western views, China is in Africa for business. Between 1998 and 2012, about 2000 Chinese firms invested in 49 countries on the African continent.
The strategy of Brazil, Russia, India and China towards African development seems to be muddled with selfish national interests. Their focus is on areas critical to the growth of their economies.
Jan Smuts Professor of International Relations and Director of the African Centre for the Study of the United States (ACSUS), University of the Witwatersrand