Author: Sun Baohong.

Good afternoon! Let me begin by extending my gratitude to Dr. Amos for inviting me to attend IPMATIIC AFRICA 2014. I would also like to express my respect to you for your ambition of achieving total industrial independence of Africa and your efforts for it. In the past 18 years of my diplomatic career on African affairs, I have always been thinking about how Africa should achieve great development. There is really a lot on which we can exchange ideas. The topic of my speech today is China’s Success Story and Its Relevance to Africa. China is viewed as the biggest miracle in terms of development in human history due to its glittering achievements. In the past over 30 years, China’s average growth rate exceeds 9 percent. Hundreds of millions of people are pulled out of poverty. The largest scale of infrastructure construction and urbanization have taken place in China. And China’s education, science and technology develop by leaps and bounds. Just 10 years ago, China ranked 6th largest economy and 4th largest exporter in the world. In 2013, China’s GDP soared up to around $9.4 trillion, ranking the 2nd largest economy in the world. Its total import-export value reached $4.16 trillion, ranking the first place globally. Nowadays, the whole world is sensitive to even the slightest fluctuation of China’s economy. It has brought to the wide attention of the international community that China's GDP growth slipped to a 24-year low of 7.4% in the first quarter of this year. Some forces thereby predict a gloomy prospect for China’s further development. In fact, if we take into consideration of the complex and tough world economic situation, weak recovery of major developed economies and in-depth economic restructuring of China, it’s natural to conclude that China’s macro-economy still presents a good performance. The stubborn pessimism about China’s economy reflects doubts, derogation, and even hatred on the development model of China.