Want China Times, Staff Reporter 2014-05-09
After visiting Ethiopia, Chinese premier Li Keqiang traveled on to Nigeria for his second stop in Africa to ink a 80.7 billion yuan (US$12.9 billion) project by a Chinese state firm to help development the country's railway network, evidence of China's push for "railway diplomacy" to improve its diplomatic, economic and trade relations with West African countries, the Shanghai-based China Business News reports.
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| Chinese premier Li Keqiang, left, meets Nigerian president Goodluck Jonathan in Abuja, May 7. (Photo/Xinhua) |
After visiting Ethiopia, Chinese premier Li Keqiang traveled on to Nigeria for his second stop in Africa to ink a 80.7 billion yuan (US$12.9 billion) project by a Chinese state firm to help development the country's railway network, evidence of China's push for "railway diplomacy" to improve its diplomatic, economic and trade relations with West African countries, the Shanghai-based China Business News reports.
Li is
paying official visits to Ethiopia, Nigeria, Angola and Kenya from May 4 to 11.
This is the first time Li has visited the African continent since taking office
last year.
Jim
O'Neill, the retiring chairperson of Goldman Sachs best known for coining the
term BRIC, the acronym that stands for Brazil, Russia, India and China–the four
rapidly developing countries that have come to symbolize the shift in global
economic power away from the developed G7 economies–has recently coined a new
term, MINT, referring to Mexico, Indonesia, Nigeria and Turkey, as the next
investment hot spots.
Ethiopia
and Kenya, which have good relations with China, are the main target for
China's aid programs in Africa, while Nigeria, now the biggest economy on the
continent, and Angola, which offers abundant oil and mineral resources, are
China's main energy partners, experts said.
In April,
after revising the calculation method of its GDP, Nigeria exceeded South Africa
as the largest economy in Africa. The most populous nation in Africa also has
the continent's most complete manufacturing industry chains. Currently, the
European Union is negotiating with the Economic Community Of West African
States, with Nigeria at the center of negotiations.
Nigeria has
not as yet made many demands for assistance from China and it chiefly needs
project cooperation and investment in its industries from China, said Wang Luo,
director of the Chinese Academy of International Trade and Economic
Cooperation, a research and advisory arm of the Ministry of Commerce. The aim
of Li's visit is chiefly to maintain good relations between China and African
countries, Wang said.
Nigeria is
China's second-biggest export destination, with Angola in sixth place and Kenya
in 10th, while Ethiopia did not make the top 10. The top 10 African countries
together account for 70.2% of China's exports to the continent.
China aims
to help its labor-intensive industries diversify into Africa, expanding the
"made-in-Africa" operations amid rising production costs on the
Chinese mainland, the report said.
Li arrived
at the international airport in the Angolan capital of Luanda to start his
official visit to the country, at the invitation of Angolan president Jose
Eduardo dos Santos on March 8, according to a report from Hong Kong-based Wen
Wei Po.
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