Transport Chronicle
"Silk Roads", the underside of the China-Africa relationship
Audio 02:30
Chinese President Xi Jinping, April 2022. © AP/Ng Han Guan
By: Marina Mielczarek
4 mins
How will Chinese transport change Africa?
This is one of the questions of the French documentary entitled
The world according to Xi Jinping.
Broadcast two years ago, before the Covid-19 pandemic, the film explained behind the scenes of the Chinese president's ambitions in the world and in particular in Africa.
A conquest of the continent due to the purchase or construction of seaports, railways and highways.
How has the health crisis changed the “silk roads” project?
An updated version of the documentary can now be seen on the Arte website.
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It's like a bicycle wheel.
A core in the middle: China.
And whose rays go out in all directions, the continents of the world.
This is the image given by Sophie Lepault, the director of the documentary
Le monde vu par Xi Jinping
.
Since 2013, the “silk roads” have anticipated any American sanction or health crisis
To make the “silk roads” strategy understood is to explain this relationship to time.
A long-term view that particularly struck Sophie Lepault on her return from China: “
What I learned by investigating in circles close to the Chinese president is this political ambition behind the economic ambition.
When Xi Jinping proposes to an African country to invest in highways or bridges or ports, he is at the same time proposing a model based solely on the economy.
This is his way of saying:
"China will enrich itself by enriching countries that Westerners have failed to develop"
".
► To read and listen: War in Ukraine: what impact on the "new silk roads"?
Whether in Africa or on other continents, the other approach that the documentary shows well is this give and take hidden behind the
"silk roads"
, in other words support from the countries where it invests with the authorities international: the United Nations, the African or European Union...
No Covid-19 effect
Nadège Rolland is a researcher at the National Bureau of Asian Research in Washington.
Asked in the documentary, she talks about the health crisis which, according to her, does not change anything in the Chinese strategy: “
Simply because that is exactly what the Chinese seem to have planned!
This desire of the USA and Europeans to bring together and relocate their industry after the pandemic does not in any way modify the project.
Since the beginning in 2013, these constructions of the new "
silk roads" have been decided to re-knit international exchanges.
A desire to put China at the center while developing new factories and axes closer to rich countries, where circulation was more difficult or non-existent
.
The sea, the privileged way
However, a clue shows that the Chinese must take into account current events in the world: their choice for the boat.
War in Ukraine (with countries to cross thanks to customs duties) towards Europe, risks moderating enthusiasm for transport by train or by land.
This is the opinion of Xavier Aurégan, specialist in relations between Africa and China at the French Institute of Geopolitics.
► Also to listen: The EU wants to counter the Chinese "Silk Roads": "The European strategy is evolving"
During the Covid-19 crisis, “
Western countries said they were going to have their goods manufactured closer to home so they would no longer be dependent on China.
But that's much easier said than done!
This does not (and will not) happen overnight!
Even so... the Chinese are already anticipating by favoring transport by sea. Construction of ports, management of these ports along the African and Mediterranean coasts.
They are investing in Egypt, Morocco and the Emirates by ousting competition such as the Bolloré, DPWorld or MSC groups
”.
50% of Chinese in Africa come from the poorest regions of China
Half of the Chinese workers present in Africa come from the poorest regions of China, in particular from Hunan (center-east of the country).
In the future, China would like to see Africa play the role of the workshop of the world, especially in textiles.
Role that this same China has been playing for Westerners for a century.
The Chinese, who remain Africa's leading economic partners, would reserve transport for more expensive products, which are therefore more profitable to export.
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