Translate the following intoChinese
The Chinese-African relationship is important to both sides, but also unbalanced
No other country comes near the depth and breadth of China’s engagement in
Africa. It is Africa’s largest trading partner, bilateral creditor and a crucial
source of infrastructure investment. Chinese firms account for an estimated
one-eighth of the continent’s industrial output. Chinese-built digital
infrastructure is critical to the platforms on which Africans communicate.
Political, military and security ties are becoming closer. Understanding the
China-Africa relationship is key to understanding the continent—and the global
ambitions of Xi Jinping.
The modern history of this relationship has three phases. During the cold war
China supplied aid, constructed the odd railway or parliament building and
tried, mostly unsuccessfully, to export Maoism. But the main thrust of its
relationship was political. China saw newly independent African countries as
potential allies. In 1971, when the un voted for China to take over its seat
from Taiwan, 26 African countries sided with Mao. “It is our African brothers
who have carried us into the un,” he said.
The second phase, from the 1990s, was defined by economics. For a booming China,
Africa mattered. Oil and metals were imported from the continent; surpluses of
money and manufacturing went the other way. To African countries that had just
thrown off one-party rule and ended years of stagnation, China gave useful
infrastructure. China went from net recipient of aid to “lender of first
resort”, notes a new book, “Banking on Beijing”, by Axel Dreher and colleagues.
From 2000 to 2014 Chinese aid and, especially, loans meant only America gave
more development finance. More than half China’s development projects were in
Africa.
This period still shapes thinking about China-Africa relations. But, as Daniel
Large of the Central European University argues in another book, “A New Era” has
emerged under Mr Xi, who has made four tours of Africa as president and nine in
all. He “has been remaking China’s Africa relations in his own image,” argues Mr
Large. (Barack Obama was the last American president to visit.)
Economic ties still count. But since 2016 China’s lending to Africa has shrunk.
It builds fewer mega-projects, putting more emphasis on trade and investment.
And politics has again become a driving force. China’s attitude to Africa is
part of Mr Xi’s assertive foreign policy. His approach gives a greater role to
the Chinese Communist Party, which has a membership larger than the population
of all but four African countries.