Author: Martyn Davies, Hannah Edinger, Nastasya Tay, Sanusha Naidu.

The Centre for Chinese Studies at Stellenbosch University embarked on this research project to gather information and gain insight into China’s aid policies vis-à-vis Africa. The research is intended to inform both Chinese and traditional donor efforts toward the continent. China’s “new foray” into Africa is attracting much international attention and contentious debate. China is seemingly engaging Africa on new terms – terms that are not shaped by traditional powers, nor perhaps even by Africans themselves. It represents a new approach to the continent that the authors have termed China’s “coalition engagements” in Africa – a collaborative state- business approach to foreign policy. China’s foreign aid forms an integral component of this paradigm. Chinese foreign policy towards Africa at the turn of the century underwent a dramatic shift. As “China Inc.” started to internationalise after 1998, Africa became a strategic focus for Chinese outward-bound companies, especially in the extractive industries. Beijing accorded Africa renewed importance. This resulted in the conceptualisation and creation of a new vehicle, the Forum for China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) housed within the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, to coordinate Chinese foreign policy objectives toward Africa. Through FOCAC, China’s Ministries of Foreign Affairs and Commerce are starting to align their respective responsibilities toward more effective coordination and implementation of a Chinese foreign and aid policy toward Africa. This attempt at formulating a coherent foreign policy between two government departments is playing out in Africa but this joint departmental coordination is being made more difficult by the dramatic increase in aid spending by Beijing. The government of the People’s Republic of China has a broad and, at times, vague definition of what constitutes foreign aid. While there may be gradual alignment of Chinese aid with the OECD-DAC’s definition of the constitution of “aid” over the medium term, some unique components of China’s approach will remain. The monitoring of its aid commitments and their implementation is proving difficult, even for the Ministry of Commerce, as well as government think-tanks. China’s approach has been one of mutual respect, also awarding small African countries with relatively little economic or political significance, with aid and investment support. However , it is likely that resource-rich countries such as Angola, Sudan, Nigeria and Zambia, as well as more politically strategic countries, such as South Africa, Ethiopia and Egypt, are priority countries in China’s broader African engagemen