China-Africa Economic and Trade Cooperation Towards High Quality Development

The first China-Africa Economic and Trade Exposition and China-Africa Economic and Trade Cooperation Forum recently ended in Changsha, Hunan Province. This is the first major action of China's "Eight Action" on Africa-Africa cooperation, and is the practical action to promote the construction of a closer China-Africa destiny community. Focusing on supporting Africa to foster endogenous growth capacity, China and African countries are working together to promote high-quality development of Sino-African economic and trade cooperation in the new era.

What achievements have been made in the first China-Africa Economic and Trade Fair? A set of figures is sufficient to illustrate that 53 African countries participated, more than 1600 foreign guests, more than 3500 domestic and foreign exhibitors, purchasers and professional audiences participated in the exhibition, and more than 10 international groups, such as the United Nations Industrial Organization and the World Trade Organization, participated in the exhibition. Organizations and institutions, eight financial institutions, more than 150 first-class central enterprises and their subsidiaries, and nearly 800 key enterprises in domestic industries participated actively in the exhibition. Fourteen activities and five major exhibitions were well received, with more than 100,000 people attending the exhibition, and African goods were "snatched up and emptied".

According to the announcement of the Organizing Committee, the Expo focused on trade, agriculture, cooperative parks, infrastructure, investment and financing, and held 14 activities and one exhibition. The supporting exhibition of China-Africa Economic and Trade Fair was held in Mango Pavilion of Hunan International Convention and Exhibition Center. It covers an area of 40,000 square meters. 53 African countries and 28 provinces and municipalities independently set up exhibitions. More than 60 central enterprises and 700 private enterprises participated in the exhibition. The exhibition of special products and folk customs from African countries attracted many Changsha citizens. High-quality South African red wine, exquisite Egyptian carpet, mellow Ethiopian coffee and so on "brush screen" in Changsha people's circle of friends. During the Expo period, a number of tangible economic and trade achievements landed. China and Africa signed 84 cooperation documents involving more than 20 countries in Africa, including Angola, Czech Republic, Senegal, Tanzania and Uganda, totaling US$20.8 billion, covering trade, investment, infrastructure, agriculture, manufacturing and other fields.

"This fully demonstrates that, as a concrete measure to build a closer China-Africa destiny community, the establishment of China-Africa Economic and Trade Fair meets the common expectations of the Central African people, meets the practical needs of China-Africa economic and trade cooperation, helps actively explore new paths for cooperation, opens up growth points for cooperation, and promotes the development of China-Africa economic and trade cooperation to a high quality. " Luo Jianjun, inspector of Hunan Provincial Government Office, said.

In recent years, Sino-African economic and trade cooperation has been developing in an all-round, multi-level and wide-ranging way. China has become Africa's largest trading partner for 10 consecutive years. Its trade structure has been continuously optimized, and China's imports of non-resource products to Africa have also increased significantly. While trade cooperation is steadily improving, China-Africa industrial investment has also achieved deep integration. By the end of 2018, China had set up more than 3700 enterprises in Africa, and its stock of direct investment in non-industry exceeded 46 billion US dollars.

Enhancing local cooperation and promoting enterprise cooperation are the focus and highlight of this exposition. Cooperation with Africa is changing from a pattern in which the state and large-scale enterprises were predominant in the past to the participation of large-scale state enterprises, local governments and small and medium-sized enterprises. During the exposition, Vice Minister of Commerce Qian Keming said that the reason why the China-Africa Exposition was held in Hunan was that Hunan's advanced experience in agricultural products processing, manufacturing and renewable energy development was taken into account. "We hope to further strengthen Hunan's cooperation with Africa in terms of its superior production capacity, industries and products, and jointly promote China-Africa economic and trade cooperation to achieve more and newer results."

China-Africa economic and trade cooperation has achieved fruitful results, and the cooperation in the field of non-governmental economy between China and Africa has made great contributions. When Chinese enterprises enter Africa, state-owned enterprises are more likely to play an important role in infrastructure and energy fields such as construction, mining, etc. Private enterprises mainly invest in manufacturing and service industries. According to the Ministry of Commerce, private enterprises now account for more than 70% of China's investment in Africa, and have become the main force in investment cooperation with Africa.

Huajian Group, a women's shoe manufacturer from Dongguan, invested in the construction of Enterprise Park in Ethiopia, which promoted the coordinated development of the upstream and downstream industries of Ethiopia's shoemaking and formed an industrial cluster in the region. Inner Mongolia Luwang Cashmere Group has built five factories in Madagascar, employing 6500 local employees and technical managers. The localization rate has reached 80%; the voice group has provided nearly 400 million mobile phones to more than 300 million people in Africa; the Sida Group has provided digital television services to more than 50 million people in 10 million families in 30 African countries... In recent years, a large number of China's private enterprises, which are in the leading level in the domestic and global industries, have been intensively cultivating in Africa. They have not only improved their international operation ability and realized their development, but also supported the economic and social development of African countries with practical actions. They have made great contributions in industrial upgrading, tax creation and employment promotion.

In recent years, the overseas cooperation area has become an important support for China's investment in Africa, and has become an important platform and starting point to promote the construction of "one belt and one road", deepen international capacity cooperation, and promote win-win cooperation between the two sides. Overseas cooperative zones have accelerated the growth of China's investment in non-industrial chain integration, and the effect of industrial agglomeration has gradually emerged.