The 2024 summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC), held from September 4 to 6 in Beijing, has reinforced China’s geopolitical clout over Africa. The FOCAC, which was established in 2000, holds triennial summits. The theme of the ninth summit was “Joining Hands to Advance Modernization and Build a High-Level China-Africa Community with a Shared Future”. Attended by China and 53 African countries, it adopted the Beijing Declaration on “Jointly Building an All-Weather China-Africa Community with a Shared Future for the New Era”. The growing stature of China in Africa, in what China calls the “new era”, has markedly upset the established geopolitical configurations in the continent and also Africa’s perceptions about China.
China and Africa combined is home to 2.8 billion people, accounting for a third of the world’s population. China is the world’s largest developing economy, and the African continent has the largest number of developing countries. China has a long history of engagement with Africa, which predates the age of colonialism. During the naval diplomacy expeditions of Admiral Zheng He in the 15th century, the Ming era treasure fleet was recorded to have visited East Africa. With the rise of European powers, both China and Africa came under colonial rule.
During the Cold War, as African countries came out of the clutches of colonialism, the Maoist revolution in China provided ideological support and developmental assistance to its African counterparts in the “Third World”.
Following economic reforms, the country, with its rapidly growing economy and technological capability, sought to satisfy its quest for new resources and markets. Africa offered it the promise of vast and unexploited resources, especially hydrocarbons, critical minerals, arable land, forestry, and fisheries. It also dovetailed with Africa’s quest for development outside the ambit of Western powers and financial institutions after its “lost decades”.
The geostrategic logic of China’s engagement with Africa
China’s entry into the World Trade Organization opened the floodgates of economic engagement with Africa in the 21st century. Today, Africa is the largest source of oil for China, and China is Africa’s largest trading partner, with a trade volume of $258 billion. China has already displaced Western economies as the largest destination of Africa’s exports. Africa’s exports to China are primarily raw materials, and China exports finished goods to Africa, with the continent running a trade deficit with China.
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Apart from oil, China sources minerals such as copper, aluminium, iron, uranium, lithium, chromium, and cobalt from Africa. China has diplomatic relations with all countries in Africa, except the small, landlocked state of Eswatini, which recognises Taiwan instead of China.
Africa has 54 countries represented in the UN, accounting for a fourth of the world body’s membership, and all of them are developing countries. Africa’s potential as a decisive vote bank is, hence, instrumental in increasing China’s role in global governance. Africa is also a crucial third pillar (and the least developed) of the Global South, the others being Asia-Oceania and Latin America-Caribbean. Therefore, China’s role in elevating Africa’s development status will give credence to its claim for leadership of the Global South.
Highlights
- The 2024 summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC), held from September 4 to 6 in Beijing, has reinforced China’s geopolitical clout over Africa.
- Africa is a continent with immense geopolitical significance. China has advanced its interests in Africa by utilising its economic, diplomatic, and security instruments.
- Over the past two decades, China has invested around $143 billion in Africa and provided about $170 billion in loans. China is the largest lender in the infrastructure sector, providing long-term loans rather than grants.
Africa is a continent with immense geopolitical significance, as recognised by renowned geopolitical theorists. Halford Mackinder, who propounded the “Heartland theory” in the early 20th century, identified two heartlands—regions that hold the key to world domination because of their geographic peculiarities. The primary heartland is the vast, unbroken, and secluded resource-rich plains of inner Eurasia; the second is Africa (Sub-Saharan Africa to be exact). At a time when technology was not as advanced as it is today, the African heartland remained relatively inaccessible and infeasible for effective and unified control. It is no coincidence that there was a “scramble for Africa” among the Western colonial powers in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and that the continent acted as a theatre of the Cold War later on.
The Soviet Union sought to establish its presence in Africa, resulting in the continent being characterised by Saul Bernard Cohen as a “shatterbelt”, a politically divided zone, whose stability is further undermined by the competition among the major powers in world politics. It is, therefore, clear geopolitical logic that China, which has rising global ambitions, would necessarily want to control this “heartland” and, in the process, turn Africa into a shatterbelt after two decades of relative growth and stability.
China’s ‘emerging approach’ towards Africa
China seems to have eventually filled the vacuum created by the retreat of the Soviet Union from the continent. It has advanced its interests in Africa by utilising its economic, diplomatic, and security instruments. In addition to trade, China has utilised the investment and financial levers in its economic engagement with Africa. Over the past two decades, China has invested around $143 billion in Africa and provided about $170 billion in loans. The major destinations of China’s investments in Africa are the continent’s larger countries such as Nigeria, Angola, Ethiopia, South Africa, and Algeria.
Even though the US remains the largest donor of aid to Africa, China is the largest lender in the infrastructure sector. This financial assistance is usually in the form of long-term loans rather than grants. The loans are primarily provided by the Export-Import Bank of China and the China Development Bank and at near market rates unlike the concessional rates offered by Western lenders. Around 12 per cent of Africa’s external debt is owed to China, with Angola being the largest debtor to China in the continent, followed by Ethiopia, Kenya, Zambia, and Nigeria. However, China’s lending has come down over the past decade after hitting its peak in 2016, and is partly reflective of its economic slowdown. Nevertheless, China has not yet expressed its readiness to come up with any debt relief measures.
China has also expanded and diversified its security engagement with Africa. In 2019, China became the second largest contributor of peacekeeping forces to Africa. During the 2016-20 period, China emerged as the second largest supplier of arms to Africa; Nigeria, Ethiopia, and Angola led the arms imports from China.
Besides advances in peacekeeping and arms sales, China’s security engagement in Africa has widened its scope. China’s first military base outside its territory was established in Djibouti in 2015, indicating a paradigm shift in the country’s approach towards Africa. It is also speculated that China is pursuing a military base in Equatorial Guinea, which would provide China a military presence in the Atlantic coast facing the Americas. China is also providing training to the military and police forces of some African countries; it has already established a military training school in Tanzania. In light of growing threats to the security of Chinese investments and personnel, China has also deployed private security contractors in some parts of Africa.
At Chinese phone manufacturing company MiOne’s factory in Sino-Uganda Mbale Industrial Park in Mbale, Uganda, in January 2024. | Photo Credit: Luke Dray/Bloomberg
China’s diplomatic approach towards Africa utilises both bilateral and multilateral channels. For the past three decades, it has been an annual diplomatic ritual that the first visit of China’s Foreign Minister every year is to Africa. By doing this, China has consistently signalled to Africa the significance it attaches to the continent.
Newer and more general trends reflect the overall transformation of China’s diplomacy. Diplomacy in the “new era” under President Xi Jinping is marked by concepts such as “building a community with a shared future for mankind”, the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), the Global Development Initiative, the Global Security Initiative, and the Global Civilization Initiative—the same rubric is applied to Africa. China has also worked towards elevating the levels of diplomatic engagements in Africa. In 2015, China signed a strategic partnership agreement with the African Union (AU). This was followed by a 2018 agreement synchronising the AU’s Agenda 2063 and China’s BRI. In the 2021 FOCAC summit, the “China-Africa Cooperation Vision 2035” was adopted to guide China-Africa relations into the future.
The Beijing Declaration and Xi Jinping’s speech delivered at the 9th FOCAC Summit opens a window into China’s emerging approach towards Africa in the “new era”. The Beijing Declaration reiterates that China will “continue to respect African countries’ political and economic choices based on their own national conditions and honour the principles of non-interference in African countries’ internal affairs and nonattachment of political strings to assistance to Africa”.
Leveraging the ‘shared colonial experience’
In sharp contrast to its Western partners, China has been batting for more representation of Africa in global multilateral fora. According to the Beijing Declaration: “China believes that Africans are qualified to serve as heads of international organizations and institutions, and supports their work.”
China has strengthened its attack on the West by leveraging the colonial legacy. While the Western powers in Africa have cultivated their influence in the continent on the basis of their colonial ties to the continent, China has initiated its relationship with Africa on basis of revolutionary resistance against colonialism and imperialism. Therefore, the Beijing Declaration supports the “Proclamation on Building a United Front to Promote the Cause of Justice and Payment of Reparations to Africans”, which was brought out for the first time in the 37th African Union summit held in February 2024.
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China has also supported in the Declaration the cause of countries that are under sanctions from the West, such as Eritrea, Sudan, South Sudan, and Zimbabwe. It has clearly expressed its interests in acting as a mediator for conflicts in Africa, projecting itself as a stakeholder of regional peace and stability.
In his speech at the summit, Xi proposed to elevate bilateral ties between China and all African countries to the level of “strategic relations”. He reiterated the shared colonial experience of China and Africa and urged the two sides to work towards modernisation that is “just and equitable”, and keeping in mind “our national realities” instead of merely following the “general rules”. Xi also proposed 10 partnership actions aimed at mutual learning among civilisations, trade prosperity, industrial chain cooperation, connectivity, development cooperation, health, agriculture and livelihoods, people-to-people exchanges, green development, and common security.
Xi also unveiled his plan to provide “zero-tariff treatment for 100 percent tariff lines” for all the 33 Least Developed Countries in Africa, the first such initiative by any large economy or developing country. For all these initiatives, Xi pledged $50 billion for the next three years, which includes $30 billion in credit, $10 billion in assistance, and $10 billion in investment by Chinese companies. Xi also pledged to create one million jobs for Africa. It is clear that the 2024 summit marks a significant landmark in China’s engagement with Africa with key advances on the political, diplomatic, economic, and security fronts.
Geopolitical ramifications and responses
According to studies, China still trails behind the US in terms of perceptions in Africa, with the American model of development being more preferred than the Chinese. However, it remains way ahead of the former colonial powers in this respect. The perceptions about China seem to be the most positive in the Sahel (West and Central African region) probably as a result of a lingering development deficit and disenchantment with Western developmental and security partners like France.
It is also in this region that numerous military coups have happened of late, overthrowing civilian governments that supported status-quo relations with France. These coups have led to the rise of governments in Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger that show an increased preference for Russia as a security partner.
It is obvious that China stands to benefit from the windfall, given the current alignments of the major power rivalry. Moreover, the Israel-Palestine conflict has strengthened China’s influence in Africa as it has managed to tap into the latter’s historical affinity to Palestine by opposing Israel’s offensive in Gaza. Nevertheless, there seems to be a significant and growing acknowledgement about the overdependence on China.
Although China is seen as an alternative development partner to Africa, sceptics argue that China’s investment in infrastructure is designed to facilitate extraction and transportation of the resource wealth away from the continent, while treating Africa as a dumping ground for China’s cheap products. This is of added concern when the West has adopted protectionist measures against the massive surge of Chinese exports. It is feared that the excess capacity thus accumulated will be diverted to parts of the Global South like Africa.
A train arrives at the Nairobi Terminus on the outskirts of Kenya’s capital. It was launched to operate on the Standard Gauge Railway line constructed by the China Road and Bridge Corporation and financed by the Chinese government, a 2017 photograph. | Photo Credit: REUTERS
China had previously earned considerable negative publicity in Africa for utilising imported Chinese labour rather than providing jobs to Africans—an area where China has made some course corrections in response. Similarly, China has expressed its support towards “helping supplying countries of raw materials to increase the value of their industrial chains”, as stated in the Beijing Declaration, considering Africa’s dissatisfaction with China not accommodating it at the higher levels of industrial value chains built on African resources.
Issues of adverse environmental impacts, however, continue to plague Chinese investments in Africa, despite the growth of green investments. As a leader in the green technology sector, China sources a huge quantum of critical minerals from Africa, causing significant environmental harm to resource-rich regions and localities in Africa.
It is not just environmental health that is at stake in Africa because of China’s growing presence but also its economic and political health. There are growing concerns about the rise in debts owed to China, and the fear of an eventual threat to African sovereignty due to excessive dependence. This has escalated in the wake of recent defaults in countries such as Sri Lanka, and Zambia in Africa itself, which were beholden to China’s financial largesse.
The issue of corruption and violation of human and labour rights are also major causes of concern. Under the guise of non-intervention in internal affairs, China not just turns a blind eye to the above issues but pursues opaque deals and even supports authoritarian regimes. As a result, China has featured as a major election issue in countries like Zambia, Zimbabwe, and Ghana; there have been instances of attacks too against Chinese personnel in South Africa, Kenya, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
The contest between India and China
Traditional external powers have been wary of China’s growing clout in the continent, especially in the contemporary scenario of growing geopolitical rivalry among major powers. The US has categorised China’s activities in Africa as nothing short of “destabilising”. China and Russia have a shared interest in displacing the West’s influence in Africa, and this may increasingly play out in the coming years.
India also has stakes in Africa that are getting increasingly entangled with China’s activities in the region. India’s ties have stronger historical roots perhaps than those of China, given the trade and exchanges that have taken place across the Indian Ocean over centuries and even millennia. Similar to China, the shared colonial experience and developmental status have forged relationships of a fraternal nature between both sides.
Currently, India has displaced China as the largest developing country in terms of population. However, India’s trade, investment, and aid in Africa, as well as its diplomatic and security presence in the continent are certainly not on a par with that of China. Nevertheless, India has boosted its diplomatic missions, stepped up its economic engagement, and enhanced its security engagement with Africa.
India has also involved Africa in major multilateral initiatives on energy and environment, such as the International Solar Alliance, the Global Biofuel Alliance, and the Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure. It has even shared technologies related to its Digital Public Infrastructure with African countries. Perhaps, India’s most significant gesture towards Africa in recent times was its proactive effort to add the AU as a permanent member of the G20 during India’s 2023 presidency. Perhaps with this in mind, the Beijing Declaration of 2024 included a line that stated: “Africa appreciates that China is the first country to support the AU in joining the G20.”
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However, unlike China’s omni-directional approach in Africa, India’s diplomatic efforts in the region are primarily concentrated in the eastern and southern parts of Africa. This is because of historical economic and societal ties to countries in these regions, thanks to the geographical connectivity via the Indian Ocean.
The fact that some of these countries were also former British colonies is another common thread. Significantly, Mauritius, with strong societal, economic, and defence ties to India, is the only African country other than Eswatini to eschew China’s BRI.
India needs to build its diplomatic outreach outside traditional regions of influence and at the same time leverage its goodwill in the continent to engage consistently with its Western partners and with Japan, which have deeper financial and techno-industrial resources at their disposal. India also needs to push for Africa’s inclusion in the Indo-Pacific framework so that its interests are better represented; Africa stands to benefit by “riding the Indo-Pacific wave”.
India can provide a counter to the “China alternative” and ensure that the continent does not relapse into shatterbelt status in the era of renewed geopolitical rivalry, becoming a theatre for proxy wars.
Dr Anand V. is an assistant professor (Senior Scale) at the Department of Geopolitics and International Relations, Manipal Academy of Higher Education, Manipal. The views expressed in the article are personal.
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