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Africa wants its economic relationship with China to change – here’s what Africa is asking for
By Chinedu Okafor
China’s senior African diplomat stated earlier this week, during a briefing on the sidelines of the BRICS summit in South Africa that African governments want China to change its focus from developing infrastructure on the continent to local industrialization, according to a report by Reuters.
“African integration is already escalating and many African countries have asked China to consider a shift of our focus,” the director-general of China’s Department of African Affairs at its foreign ministry, Wu Peng, stated.
The Africa Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA), which was introduced at the beginning of 2021 and is meant to allow African countries to trade duty-free in the future, Wu said, made the shift all the more necessary.
On the eve of the BRICS summit, which will be held in South Africa from August 22 to 24, China discussed its intentions for the industrialization of Africa with African leaders during a special roundtable.