The sight of large delegations from Africa in Beijing is becoming commonplace. The latest to arrive is led by President Jacob Zuma of South Africa.
China is now South Africa’s largest trading partner. Indeed, the Chinese are doing business and striking deals all over Africa. Other recent examples, worth billions to the recipient countries, include deals to import coal from Mozambique and oil from Nigeria. China’s traders pop up all over Africa, and its construction companies have built roads, railways and buildings from Lesotho to Egypt.
Some western commentators – and some Africans, too – have decried China’s burgeoning relationship with the continent as a new form of colonialism, based on the search for minerals. But such criticism is largely misplaced.