Author: David Haroz.

In recent years, China has significantly expanded its engagement in Africa. While China’s interest in Africa is hardly new, the scope and scale of contemporary Chinese involvement on the continent is unprecedented. Since the early 1990s, China has broadened its relationship with Africa in numerous areas: finance, investment, trade, development assistance, tech- nology transfer and training, tourism, and cultural exchange. In many ways, China and Africa are well-suited part- ners. Much of Africa is cash-hungry, infrastructure-deficient, and resource- rich. On the other hand, China is flush with cash,1 seeks greater invest- ment opportunities for its burgeoning private sector, and requires massive natural resource infusions to feed its booming economy. This combination of respective assets and liabilities has fostered a strong China-Africa inter- dependency, as each party uses the other to reconcile its own balance sheet.