FOCAC 2024: Elevating African Interests Beyond the Africa-China Summit

Post By Diaspoint | September 4, 2024

FOCAC 2024: Elevating African Interests Beyond the Africa-China Summit

To enhance the impact of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, African countries need a more coherent strategy of engagement with China along with increased public transparency, awareness, and citizen agency.

The Ninth Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC), to be held in Beijing from September 4 to 6, takes place at a critical juncture. African economies are still distressed from the instability caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, and anger is growing over the economic consequences of unsustainable debt, some of which is manifested in popular protests. Young people are demanding equity, fairness, and transparency—including in African governments’ relations with external powers. Governments are also facing pressure to make good on their commitment to move their economies up the value chain and shift their focus from aid to trade.

The Dakar Action Plan (2022-2024), a product of the Eighth FOCAC summit held in Dakar, Senegal, in November 2021, offered a comprehensive plan for trade promotion and facilitation, strategic market access, and product value addition. China committed to importing $300 billion worth of goods from Africa between 2022 and 2024. It also offered $10 billion to improve the quality of African exports and a credit line of $10 billion to help small- and medium-sized enterprises export high-quality products into Chinese markets. Yet, monitoring these commitments is difficult, and it is unclear if, or when, these targets will be met.

FOCAC is still by-and-large shaped by a donor-recipient dynamic, where African countries mostly take a back seat while China initiates much of the agenda.

While FOCAC has emerged as a unique forum, it is still by-and-large shaped by a donor-recipient dynamic, where African countries mostly take a back seat while China initiates much of the agenda. Part of this has to do with weaknesses in strategic planning on the African side. While China regularly releases comprehensive Africa strategy documents—such as the white papers of 2006, 2015, and 2021—African countries have little coherent strategy for China.

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