The New Presence of China in Africa

14 Meine Pieter van Dijk
2. The goods and services rendered to African countries
African countries export a range of products, in particular many natural resources. 6
China , for example, buys wood in Congo Brazzaville and iron ore in South
Africa . China is a center of manufacturing activities, which require these raw
materials, and it wants to export an important part of its production to other
countries, being part of all kinds of global value chains (Schmitz and Messner,
eds, 2008).
Broadman (2006) suggests, however, that both China and India’s south-south
commerce with Africa is about far more than natural resources. He is optimistic
that this opens the way for Africa to become a processor of commodities and a
competitive supplier of goods and services to these countries. This would be a
major departure from Africa’s long-established relations with the North. However,
countries like Tanzania find it difficult to compete in an international or
global context, while their markets are flooded with cheap Chinese products (see
Box 1.1). It is also difficult for Tanzania to compete with the other countries in
the region, for example South Africa , which is considered to have a very advanced
economy.
Box 1.1
An example of global competition: tailors and waste in Tanzania
Informal tailors no longer compete with modern textile and garment industries in Tanzania.
They have to produce at lower prices than Chinese textile and garment industries and have
to come up with more attractive products than the second-hand clothing from Europe,
which is available almost everywhere nowadays.
Scrap metal has already become valuable in Tanzania for exports, and the hope is that
people will recover plastic in the future. Currently most of the plastic bottles are compressed
and exported to China ! Hence, it is important that there will be a plastic recycling plant in
Tanzania soon.
Source: Van Dijk (2008)
China ’s trade with Africa has risen more than tenfold in a decade to 55 billion
US$ in 2006 (Financial Times, 17 May, 2007) and reached 100 billion in 2008.
The composition is somewhat one sided. Mainly raw materials go to China and
industrial products are coming back. China is the most important trade partner
for Africa, bigger than the EU and the United States. Trade statistics show trade
between China and Africa has increased fourfold in the first five years of this
century (Internationale Samenwerking, September 2006: 38). African exports to
China increased from some three billion US$ in 2000 to nineteen billion US$
in 2005 and 26.7 billion in 2006. Jacoby (2007: 34) notes a 30 percent annual