Are the Chinese outsmarting Americans in investing in Africa?

During an interview with the American national Public radio- NPR, the US National Security Advisor Susan Rice attempted to point out the differences in how Americans and Chinese do business in Africa, suggesting that Chinese businesses bring in their own workers for projects in Africa, while American companies give those opportunities to locals and builds their capacities to maintain the infrastructure once construction is complete. However, Howard French, author of China’s Second Continent, contested those words and pointed out that American engagement on the ground in Africa is nearly absent, bringing up examples of American construction projects in Africa that were outsourced to a Chinese firm.

Take Chinese trader Sun Qiaoming. He operates his import-export business on the Eastern coast of China, where there is plenty of space for a man with his drive and skills to prosper. Already fairly successful, he recently set his sights beyond his country’s borders. “There’s been much talk about the Chinese Dream in the

past few years, but I have an African Dream.” he said. “African gold will fill my next bucket of gold.” He plans to set up a textiles factory in Addis Ababa, as the cost of labor escalates in China. His “gold” is the labor in Africa—cheap, trainable, abundant, and ready to work. However, in other cases, plenty of Chinese workers have been deported amid allegations of doing jobs that the locals could do effectively. For example, in Angola, thousands of Chinese laborers were deported, and in Nairobi, Kenya, in 2012, hawkers protested of the increasing presence of Chinese hawkers in Nairobi’s streets.