Building Bridges: China's Growing Role as Infrastructure Financier for Sub-Saharan Africa

Abstract

China and Africa have a long history of political and economic ties, which have greatly intensified in recent years. Both bilateral trade and Chinese foreign direct investment (FDI) in Africa grew about fourfold between 2001 and 2005, accompanied by a major influx of Chinese enterprises and workers into the region. The natural resource sector, principally petroleum and to a lesser extent minerals, has been the major focus for both Chinese FDI to Africa and African exports to China. The report is structured along the following sections. Section two provides an overview of the growing economic ties between China and Africa, in particular the extent of current understanding of Chinese infrastructure finance in the region. Section three examines the data available from official Chinese government sources and discusses the methodological challenges inherent in quantifying the extent of official assistance for infrastructure finance. Section four presents the headline estimates on the value of Chinese finance based on the projects database developed for this report. Section five details the economic complementarities that exist between China and Africa, based on Africa's need for infrastructure and China's natural resource import requirements. Sections six and seven present a more detailed profile of Chinese-financed infrastructure projects in Africa on a sector-by-sector and country-by-country basis. Section eight presents the available information on financing mechanisms and terms, and considers the overall impact on country indebtedness. Section nine places the phenomenon of Chinese infrastructure finance into a broader international perspective, comparing it with flows provided by traditional Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD) financiers and other emerging players such as India and the Arab countries. Finally, section ten draws out the main conclusions and implications.

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