China Daily OpEd Calls for New Approach to Foreign Aid

China Daily published on 28 July 2020 an oped titled "New Landscape for China's Foreign Aid" by Sun Jingying, Institute of World Economics and Politics and the National Institute for Global Strategy at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. The oped is significant as China Daily is an organ of the Communist Party of China.

The author urges that because of Sino-US friction and the relentless spread of COVID-19, China needs to adopt a more proactive approach to foreign aid.  The author makes three recommendations.

First, China should focus its foreign aid on vaccine development, traditional Chinese medicine, and productive investment, and actively respond to demands for prevention and control assistance, production development, and economic recovery in the post-pandemic era.

Second, following withdrawal of the United States from the World Health Organization, China should participate in the design of a global health governance system.

Third, China should help alleviate countries' debt burden, especially those in Africa, by focusing on debt relief, boosting their economies, and increasing their incomes.