Thursday, July 2, 2020

Chinese Investment and Africa's Economic Transformation

Independent thank tank ODI published in June 2020 a study titled "Africa's Economic Transformation: The Role of Chinese Investment" by Linda Calabrese, ODI, and Xiaoyang Tang, Tsinghua University. 

The study addresses China-Africa development relations and their impact on African economies and livelihoods.  It reaches almost entirely positive conclusions. For example, it concludes that Chinese firms investing in Africa contribute to substantial job creation for African workers.  Chinese companies build the skills of host countries' workers.  Chinese investment tends to contribute to increased economic growth.  Chinese financing can contribute to unblocking the bottleneck to economic growth.  Trade has a mixed effect, but even here the effort is to emphasize the positive.