President Cyril Ramaphosa has urged a meeting of the Forum on China-Africa Co-operation in Beijing to find ways of resolving the trade imbalance between China and Africa.
The forum meets every three years to assess trade relations between China and 52 African countries.
This year’s meeting is being co-chaired by Ramaphosa and his Chinese counterpart‚ Xi Jinping, in the Chinese capital.
Ramaphosa said while China was making massive investments across the African continent‚ a mechanism needed to be found to address the trade deficit between the two.
In 2017‚ trade between China and African countries increased by about 14% to $170bn (R2.5 trillion)‚ with the Chinese getting the bigger slice of the cake.
“There’s been rapid growth‚ with Africa now being China’s largest trading partner‚” Ramaphosa said.
“Much of what is exported from Africa is raw materials and primary product. Much of what is imported from China is finished goods.
“We are exporting to China what we extract from the earth. China exports to us what it makes in its factories.
“This obviously limits the ability of African countries to extract full value for their abundant natural resources and create work for its people.
“It is through platforms like [the forum] that we should work to balance the structure of trade between Africa and China.”
Ramaphosa said he was pleased that Xi had committed to addressing the matter.
He said the value of [the forum] was becoming more important in an increasingly uncertain global environment.
“There’s a renewed threat to the rules-based‚ multilateral global trading system‚ which‚ although imperfect‚ does provide stability‚ predictability and a certain degree of fairness.
“We should be using platforms such as [the forum] to reaffirm our shared commitment to multilateralism and a fair and transparent system of international trade.”
Ramaphosa rejected the view that a new colonialism is taking place in Africa‚ owing to China’s economic role.
In his speech‚ Xi hit out at the resurgence of protectionism in the global economy – an indirect jibe at US President Donald Trump‚ who is embroiled in a trade war with China over tariffs between the two superpowers.
“China will reject protectionism and unilateralism.”
The Chinese president also announced a $10bn (R149bn) fund for development finance‚ a $5bn (R74.5bn) fund to finance imports from Africa and another $10bn in direct investments in Africa over the next three years.
“In addition‚ for Africa’s least developed‚ heavily indebted and poor countries‚ landlocked developing countries and small-island developing countries that have diplomatic relations with China‚ the debt they have incurred in the form of interest-free loans from the China government‚ due to expire in 2018‚ will be exempted.”
Xi told the African leaders that China’s investments on the continent had no political strings attached, pledging a total of $60bn (R894bn) in new development financing, on top of the $60bn Beijing offered in 2015.