50 African leaders meet in Beijing, eye big China loans, investment

China to pitch green tech exports at summit
African leaders descend on China’s capital this week, seeking funds for big-ticket infrastructure projects as they eye mounting great power competition over resources and influence on the continent.

China has expanded ties with African nations in the past decade, furnishing them with billions in loans that have helped build infrastructure but sometimes stoked controversy by saddling countries with huge debts.

China has sent thousands of workers to Africa to build its megaprojects, while tapping the continent’s vast natural resources, including copper, gold, lithium and rare earth minerals.

Beijing has said this week’s China-Africa forum will be its largest diplomatic event since the COVID-19 pandemic, with leaders of South Africa, Nigeria, Kenya and other nations confirmed to attend.

China, the world’s No. 2 economy, is Africa’s largest trading partner, with bilateral trade hitting $167.8 billion in the first half of this year, according to Chinese state media.

Beijing’s loans to African nations last year were their highest in five years, research by the Chinese Loans to Africa Database found. Top borrowers were Angola, Ethiopia, Egypt, Nigeria and Kenya.

China will urge the summit to take more of its goods, before Western curbs kick in on its exports such as electric vehicles and solar panels, in exchange for more pledges of loans and investment. But the dozens of African leaders may not be easy bait. They will want to hear how China plans to meet an unfulfilled pledge from the previous summit in 2021 to buy $300 billion of goods.

They will also seek assurances on the progress of incomplete Chinese-funded infrastructure projects, such as a railway designed to link the greater East African region.

“The prize is going to go to those countries who have carefully studied the changes in China and align their proposals with China’s new slimmed-down priorities,” said Eric Olander, co-founder of the China-Global South Project.

“That’s a big ask for a continent that generally has very poor China literacy.”