Mo
04-Feb-07, 01:58
Salam Ya shabab,
Nice to see the new SDB back online in a nicer attire, Kudos to Muaz.
Here is an article I saw online about China's reaching out to Africa. Could be a bit long, but I think is worth reading.
Link:
http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/topstories.aspx?ID=BD4A374193
Posted to the web on: 02 February 2007
Why Beijing is winning in Africa
Paul Moorcraft
-----------------------------------------------
THE Chinese are rapidly developing a successful capitalist economy — it would be a shame if the commies took over... New visitors to Beijing might be tempted to utter this paradox, especially at Christmas when the shops and tourist hotels are decked out in western festive paraphernalia. The most upmarket shops boast European mannequins, predominantly English signs and western fashions. Senior communist party officials seem rather embarrassed when westerners ask about the great revolutionary leaders of the past: Mao is as long dead as Marx.
I attended a conference in Beijing in late December on Sino-Africa relations. The senior party cadres and professors politely applauded my lecture on why China is doing better in Africa than the west. Nevertheless, except perhaps for SA, no African state is strong enough to deal equally with China. On a divided, demoralised continent, Beijing can cherry-pick almost at will.
Western perceptions
Beijing’s economic, military and diplomatic growth has been so striking that it has often caused knee-jerk reactions in Europe and the US.
There are two main schools of thought:
‖The peaceful China. Its new strategic cosmopolitanism is geared to expanding its national interest — not ideology — primarily to secure energy sources and to improve its trading patterns with the European Union and the US. Africa is merely a proving ground; and
‖The difficult China. China’s outreach is part of an exclusionary policy, working with illiberal and rogue states. North Korea is a prime example. It develops trade patterns which ignore all human rights issues.
This undermines western conditionality strategies, which aim to improve conditions in autocratic states, especially in Africa.
China could manipulate its dollar surpluses to bring down the US economy, though that would not be in Beijing’s interest, particularly at a time when it’s stealing western intellectual property worth tens of billions of dollars annually. Pirated DVDs of the new James Bond film, at less than a dollar, were on sale even before it reached western cinemas.
Chinese foreign policy is sufficiently nuanced to allow a variety of interpretations. Washington’s policy towards Beijing contains elements of mutual economic co-operation but also strategies, especially with Japan, which could counter perceived Chinese military threats.
China and Africa
The western threat perception is based on economic penetration and a concern that long-established western principles of conditionality — aid and trade in exchange for good governance — are being destabilised.
China’s trade with Africa has risen four-fold in the past four years. It is now said to be $40bn.
China has overtaken the UK to become Africa’s third most important trading partner, after the US and France. Because its oil needs are expected to double in 15 years, China has invested in particular in Sudan, Angola and Nigeria. It is also investing in forestry in Equatorial Guinea, mining in Zambia and construction in Botswana, for example.
China involved itself in Africa for ideological reasons in the 1960s and 1970s and helped with large-scale projects; the Tan-Zam railway is perhaps the best example. But this time the motivation is primarily about business, not politics.
Some western experts argue that the Chinese are now “voracious capitalistsâ€, who are generating a new scramble for Africa. This is a two-way street.
China may be pushing its Africa policy hard, but African leaders, increasingly scornful of western conditionality, are welcoming the far less judgmental Chinese way of doing of business.
What the west did wrong
Forget about the western campaigns that speak about “making poverty historyâ€; instead “make lecturing African leaders historyâ€.
Western aid hasn’t worked, especially when it is accompanied by pious and ineffective lectures and double-counting (for example, including debt relief as part of aid budgets). Giving more aid to Africa is like telling an alcoholic he needs a stiff drink to help kick his addiction. The continent was going backwards for many years until the 5% growth rate of the past three years. Chinese trade may well have played a role in this achievement.
Fading rock singers’ alliances with Prime Minister Tony Blair’s messianic vision may stir the soul of voters in the UK, but they are unlikely to benefit Africa’s poor. Opening western markets would be a more effective strategy.
What Africa needs is not liberal kindness but investment by business. But at present only very big western companies — and the Chinese — tend to take the risk. The oil majors have shown that Africa need not be stable to make a profit. Nigeria and Equatorial Guinea demonstrate that oil brings in money, but it rarely benefits the “massesâ€. Nigerian leaders in 40 years ripped off $400bn (from oil and aid money) — that’s six times the amount the US Marshall Plan spent on successfully rebuilding western Europe after the Second World War.
After more than a trillion dollars of western aid, many African citizens are poorer than ever. Western governments tried to impose good governance by lending or giving money with strings attached. But donors need to recognise that they cannot “buy†policies with their own money and expect African governments to “own†these same policies, which are imposed on them, and which often don’t work (although they can — sometimes — at the very local, “African-owned†level).
There is simply no correlation between aid and economic growth. Africans don’t need to be told that aid merely saps initiative. Africa, like any other region, wants to finance its recovery though its own resources and through direct foreign investment. But annual capital flight roughly equals aid inflows; every year Africa’s brightest talents leave, while tens of thousands of foreign “experts†briefly and often clumsily replace them. This is the economics of the madhouse.
For the African worker, there is one thing worse than being exploited by western capitalism (or Chinese neocapitalism) and that is not being exploited — ie no work. Foreign business investment in Africa is nakedly self-interested, but it should be extended beyond extractive and agricultural industries. Yes, debt relief will help (though it also makes African governments less creditworthy) but more important is the curtailment of European and American domestic protectionism — even though the West preaches free trade to Africa.
Direct western military intervention, like the billions of aid dollars, is equally counterproductive. The first priority is to keep out the guns and aid gurus, and let more businesses in (and African governments could start by dumping all the red tape, which deters economic development).
Western governments can help by encouraging the African diaspora to return; Western banks should also play a role in repatriating more of the billions that corrupt dictators have stolen from their people.
Part 1/2
Nice to see the new SDB back online in a nicer attire, Kudos to Muaz.
Here is an article I saw online about China's reaching out to Africa. Could be a bit long, but I think is worth reading.
Link:
http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/topstories.aspx?ID=BD4A374193
Posted to the web on: 02 February 2007
Why Beijing is winning in Africa
Paul Moorcraft
-----------------------------------------------
THE Chinese are rapidly developing a successful capitalist economy — it would be a shame if the commies took over... New visitors to Beijing might be tempted to utter this paradox, especially at Christmas when the shops and tourist hotels are decked out in western festive paraphernalia. The most upmarket shops boast European mannequins, predominantly English signs and western fashions. Senior communist party officials seem rather embarrassed when westerners ask about the great revolutionary leaders of the past: Mao is as long dead as Marx.
I attended a conference in Beijing in late December on Sino-Africa relations. The senior party cadres and professors politely applauded my lecture on why China is doing better in Africa than the west. Nevertheless, except perhaps for SA, no African state is strong enough to deal equally with China. On a divided, demoralised continent, Beijing can cherry-pick almost at will.
Western perceptions
Beijing’s economic, military and diplomatic growth has been so striking that it has often caused knee-jerk reactions in Europe and the US.
There are two main schools of thought:
‖The peaceful China. Its new strategic cosmopolitanism is geared to expanding its national interest — not ideology — primarily to secure energy sources and to improve its trading patterns with the European Union and the US. Africa is merely a proving ground; and
‖The difficult China. China’s outreach is part of an exclusionary policy, working with illiberal and rogue states. North Korea is a prime example. It develops trade patterns which ignore all human rights issues.
This undermines western conditionality strategies, which aim to improve conditions in autocratic states, especially in Africa.
China could manipulate its dollar surpluses to bring down the US economy, though that would not be in Beijing’s interest, particularly at a time when it’s stealing western intellectual property worth tens of billions of dollars annually. Pirated DVDs of the new James Bond film, at less than a dollar, were on sale even before it reached western cinemas.
Chinese foreign policy is sufficiently nuanced to allow a variety of interpretations. Washington’s policy towards Beijing contains elements of mutual economic co-operation but also strategies, especially with Japan, which could counter perceived Chinese military threats.
China and Africa
The western threat perception is based on economic penetration and a concern that long-established western principles of conditionality — aid and trade in exchange for good governance — are being destabilised.
China’s trade with Africa has risen four-fold in the past four years. It is now said to be $40bn.
China has overtaken the UK to become Africa’s third most important trading partner, after the US and France. Because its oil needs are expected to double in 15 years, China has invested in particular in Sudan, Angola and Nigeria. It is also investing in forestry in Equatorial Guinea, mining in Zambia and construction in Botswana, for example.
China involved itself in Africa for ideological reasons in the 1960s and 1970s and helped with large-scale projects; the Tan-Zam railway is perhaps the best example. But this time the motivation is primarily about business, not politics.
Some western experts argue that the Chinese are now “voracious capitalistsâ€, who are generating a new scramble for Africa. This is a two-way street.
China may be pushing its Africa policy hard, but African leaders, increasingly scornful of western conditionality, are welcoming the far less judgmental Chinese way of doing of business.
What the west did wrong
Forget about the western campaigns that speak about “making poverty historyâ€; instead “make lecturing African leaders historyâ€.
Western aid hasn’t worked, especially when it is accompanied by pious and ineffective lectures and double-counting (for example, including debt relief as part of aid budgets). Giving more aid to Africa is like telling an alcoholic he needs a stiff drink to help kick his addiction. The continent was going backwards for many years until the 5% growth rate of the past three years. Chinese trade may well have played a role in this achievement.
Fading rock singers’ alliances with Prime Minister Tony Blair’s messianic vision may stir the soul of voters in the UK, but they are unlikely to benefit Africa’s poor. Opening western markets would be a more effective strategy.
What Africa needs is not liberal kindness but investment by business. But at present only very big western companies — and the Chinese — tend to take the risk. The oil majors have shown that Africa need not be stable to make a profit. Nigeria and Equatorial Guinea demonstrate that oil brings in money, but it rarely benefits the “massesâ€. Nigerian leaders in 40 years ripped off $400bn (from oil and aid money) — that’s six times the amount the US Marshall Plan spent on successfully rebuilding western Europe after the Second World War.
After more than a trillion dollars of western aid, many African citizens are poorer than ever. Western governments tried to impose good governance by lending or giving money with strings attached. But donors need to recognise that they cannot “buy†policies with their own money and expect African governments to “own†these same policies, which are imposed on them, and which often don’t work (although they can — sometimes — at the very local, “African-owned†level).
There is simply no correlation between aid and economic growth. Africans don’t need to be told that aid merely saps initiative. Africa, like any other region, wants to finance its recovery though its own resources and through direct foreign investment. But annual capital flight roughly equals aid inflows; every year Africa’s brightest talents leave, while tens of thousands of foreign “experts†briefly and often clumsily replace them. This is the economics of the madhouse.
For the African worker, there is one thing worse than being exploited by western capitalism (or Chinese neocapitalism) and that is not being exploited — ie no work. Foreign business investment in Africa is nakedly self-interested, but it should be extended beyond extractive and agricultural industries. Yes, debt relief will help (though it also makes African governments less creditworthy) but more important is the curtailment of European and American domestic protectionism — even though the West preaches free trade to Africa.
Direct western military intervention, like the billions of aid dollars, is equally counterproductive. The first priority is to keep out the guns and aid gurus, and let more businesses in (and African governments could start by dumping all the red tape, which deters economic development).
Western governments can help by encouraging the African diaspora to return; Western banks should also play a role in repatriating more of the billions that corrupt dictators have stolen from their people.
Part 1/2