Officials say they expect Chinese investment in Africa to continue its upward trend, but it will not reach the same level as a decade ago.
07:25
Prepare climate-related temperature measurements for COP28, Dubai conference
Prepare climate-related temperature measurements for COP28, Dubai conference
The key players in this transition are the electric vehicle, battery and renewable energy industries, which the report’s author and director of the Griffith Asia Institute, Professor Christophe Nedpil Wang, calls the “new big three”.
Chinese companies are not only leading the way in critical minerals, but also winning energy, railway, road and real estate construction contracts in African countries.
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The Chinese company will build a 506-kilometre line linking the town of Tabora in the country’s midwest to Kigoma on Lake Tanganyika, near the border with Burundi and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. In 2021, the two Chinese companies were also appointed to construct the fifth phase of the approximately 250-kilometre SGR line connecting Ithaca town with Mwanza, Tanzania’s second largest city.
Nedpil Wang, who is also director of the Green Finance Development Center, said the top countries for investment and construction involvement were Tanzania, Democratic Republic of Congo, Nigeria, Botswana, Algeria, Zimbabwe and Ethiopia.
China says Chinese companies JCHX Mining, China’s largest molybdenum producer China Molybdenum is used to make alloys, and the world’s largest battery producer Contemporary Amperex Tech invested more than US$4 billion in the Democratic Republic of Congo last year announced plans to do so. Global investment tracker data.
In Algeria, Chinese companies including National Construction Engineering, China National Petroleum Corporation and China Communications Construction were awarded $1.2 billion worth of construction projects last year.
“This presents huge opportunities for mining and mineral processing trade, technology trade such as electric vehicle manufacturing, battery manufacturing and green energy,” Nedpil Wang said.
He also said that continued post-COVID-19 investments by the World Bank, including development finance institutions such as the World Bank, Asian Development Bank, and AIIB, will provide infrastructure opportunities for Chinese contractors. He said he was deaf.
“Once China reopens its economy, investment will resume, but lending will always be “It’s a much more important part of China’s financing.”
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Sub-Saharan geoeconomic analyst Ali Khan Sachu said Chinese investment was recovering after a period of stagnation.
“China’s engagement with Africa is naturally not going to be smooth sailing, but is long-term and strategic,” he said.
“China increased its lending to countries that were keen to pay down their debts as a kind of quid pro quo during recent tough times.
Mark Borland, senior credit research analyst at REDD Intelligence, said China’s lending to Africa is likely to increase but remain well below 2010-15 levels.
He said the main reason for this is that most African governments currently manage fairly large debts to domestic and foreign creditors and are unable to absorb much new financing.
“We therefore expect that new debt payments will lead to principal repayments on previous loans, as countries such as Angola, Cameroon and Kenya already owe large sums of money to Chinese creditors.” Bolland said.