Future Agricultures Working Paper 134
by Marco Fiorentini
January 2016
The establishment of the ‘Going Out’ (GO) policy at the beginning of the twenty-first century has reshaped China’s interactions with the world. Thanks to this strategy, private and state-owned companies have expanded their businesses overseas. This has largely involved Africa, which since the 1950s has always been very important to China’s foreign strategies. The agricultural sector has been a central constant in this partnership, and since the launch of the GO policy agriculture-related trade has grown exponentially. This has led many external observers to wonder why China decided to increase its investments in African agriculture. This paper, by analysing the import and export of agricultural machinery, food and agricultural products, aims to study the consequences the establishment of the policy has had for Sino-African relations, and to understand the reasons behind China’s increasing interest in Africa: is it to satisfy China’s increasing food demand, or to help the African continent achieve its own food security?
This paper was produced as part of the China and Brazil in African Agriculture (CBAA) project.
