Zhong Jianhua, Chinese Ambassador to South Africa (LIU HAILE)

More than 600 years ago, famous Chinese navigator Zheng He and his fleet arrived in Africa. However, it was not until the 1950s, when China and Africa were both shaking off the shackles of foreign domination, that Chinese people began paying attention to Africa.

"There are still a lot of things that China and Africa should know about each other," said Zhong Jianhua, Chinese Ambassador to South Africa. He said China should not only shoulder more responsibility in Africa, but also learn more about this continent.

Building mutual understanding

During the past three decades, China did paid more attention to its own development and economic construction, said Ambassador Zhong. As a result, China focused more on developed countries and knew better about them.

But China has always been maintaining close ties with African countries.

"Improving mutual understanding is a two-way thing. It is not fair to only require African people know more about China. We also should know more about Africa, its culture, its history and its admiration of nature," said Zhong. "African people are worth expecting. Being a diplomat, I have been in many countries in the world. But I have experienced more kindness, friendliness and warmth here in Africa than in developed countries."

In the first 10 years of the 21st century, China and African countries jointly established many Confucius Institutes in Africa to help local residents know more about Chinese language, culture and history. "This serves as a good bridge of China-Africa cultural exchange. But 10 years are not enough for the two sides to know each other well. Both sides need to make more efforts," Zhong said.

Zhong said compared with the United States and European countries, Africa is less influential in terms of culture. China must respect African people's wishes of protecting their native culture instead of forcing cultural exports.

"We should not force them to accept something they don't want," Zhong said.

In the meantime, Zhong suggests China strengthen communication with African countries and find a way to enlarge Africa's influences in China. "We must not act like the arrogant nouveau riche and despise less developed countries. Actually, there is still a lot of stuff we need to learn from them," he said.

The ambassador encourages Chinese researchers to deepen exchanges with people from all walks of life in African society, saying some Western scholars of African studies reportedly stay at least seven to eight months every year in the continent.

More work to do

China and African countries have provided huge assistance to each other in the past decades. African countries helped China resume its UN seat and its permanent membership in the UN Security Council in 1971. From the 1960s to 1970s, while China was still very poor, it started to offer assistance to Africa.

"Now China is richer and it has more duty and obligation to help African countries to develop faster," Zhong said. "But helping doesn't necessarily mean giving money to African nations. It's more important to share our experiences and lessons about development with them, telling them what kind of effort can bring good results and what cannot."

For example, China considers transportation investment as a stratagem of boosting economic growth after decades of development. Now the transportation infrastructure of most African nations is still underdeveloped. There is even no passage between neighboring English-speaking and French-speaking nations due to differences going back to the colonial period. Sometimes people must fly through London or Paris to get from one African country to another.

Zhong said because of poor transportation, trade volume inside Africa only accounts for about 10 percent of their total foreign trade volume. In Europe, the percentage can reach as high as 80 percent. The African Union has commissioned South Africa to head an infrastructure project "north-south corridor" for the whole continent. In 2010, when South African President Jacob Zuma visited China, he said that China could help with development of transportation, telecommunications and energy exploration.

Zhong also called on more Chinese volunteers to work in Africa. "Young people should travel around the world, to both developed and underdeveloped nations. This can give them more sense of mission. In the future, some of them might be experts on African studies. This will benefit both China and Africa," he stressed.

China-South Africa cooperation

Being a major emerging economy in the world, South Africa's gross domestic product reached $369.4 billion in 2010, which was about one quarter of the total GDP of all Sub-Saharan countries. It also has become an attractive market for other countries because of its population of nearly 50 million.

China and South Africa are both members of BRICS, consisting of five emerging economies—Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. Trade among these nations has increases rapidly in recent years. Trade volume between China and South Africa was $16 billion in 2009, over 10 times that in 1998 and nearly 20 percent of the total China-Africa trade in 2009. In 2010, their trade reached $25.6 billion.

Zhong said China and South Africa can greatly expand cooperation. For example, South Africa has always paid great attention to environmental protection and labor protection. Also, their labor safety standards are as strict as some developed countries'. These are all things China can learn from. Likewise, a high unemployment rate has been a headache for the South African Government. From 2007 to 2008, China suspended its textile exports to South Africa to help alleviate unemployment. However, once China ceased exporting, cheap products from other Asian countries rushed into the South African market. So the Chinese Government is still working with South Africa to solve this problem, Zhong said. Although China also has similar trouble, it has a lot of experience to share with South Africa.   

Zhong warned Chinese enterprises in Africa not to exchange long-term development for short-sighted profits.

"If their behavior cannot be accepted by local people, they will never have friendly neighbors, and they will never be welcomed by the country they invest in." Zhong said. "All Chinese enterprise should take corresponding social responsibility in accord with their capacity."

(Reporting from Pretoria, South Africa)