China offers a billion doses of vaccines to Africa – AIM report

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China offers a billion doses of vaccines to Africa – AIM report

8:16 CAT | 01 Dec 2021

Xi's promise comes as part of forum between China and African states [Andrew Galbraith/Reuters]

China has offered to provide a billion vaccines to help the African continent fight the coronavirus that causes the Covid-19 respiratory disease.

Speaking via a video link from Beijing on Monday, Chinese President Xi Jinping told the eighth ministerial conference of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC), which is being held in Dakar, that his country will also provide billions of dollars for trade and infrastructure development.

Xi explained that “to help the African Union achieve its goal of vaccinating sixty per cent of the African population by 2022, I announce that China will provide another one billion doses of vaccines to Africa, including 600 million doses as a donation and 400 million doses to be provided through such means as joint production by Chinese companies and relevant African countries. In addition, China will undertake ten medical and health projects for African countries and send 1,500 medical personnel and public health experts to Africa”.

He also announced a series of economic initiatives including ten poverty reduction and agricultural projects involving five hundred experts, technology transfer, and promoting corporate social responsibility.

On trade, China will extend its zero-tariff agreements and provide ten billion US dollars in trade finance to support African exports.

Xi also made a major announcement on investment promotion, stating that “China will encourage its businesses to invest no less than ten billion US dollars in Africa in the next three years, and will establish a platform for China-Africa private investment promotion. China will undertake ten industrialisation and employment promotion projects for Africa, provide credit facilities of ten billion US dollars to African financial institutions, support the development of African SMEs on a priority basis, and establish a China-Africa cross-border renminbi centre”.

“China will exempt African Least Developed Countries from debt incurred in the form of interest-free Chinese government loans due by the end of 2021”, he added. “China is ready to channel to African countries ten billion US dollars from its share of the IMF’s new allocation of Special Drawing Rights”.

President Xi also announced programmes to transfer digital technology, including satellite remote sensing, to promote green development, and to deliver military assistance and training.

Mozambique’s Foreign Minister Veronica Macamo is attending FOCAC and met with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi on Sunday. Yi noted his country’s willingness to cooperate in the fields of infrastructure, agriculture, and energy and to help Mozambique speed up its development within the frameworks of the Belt and Road Initiative, FOCAC, and the Forum Macao (also known as the Forum for Economic and Trade Cooperation between China and Portuguese-speaking Countries).

The two day FOCAC conference is being held under the theme “Deepen China-Africa Partnership and Promote Sustainable Development to Build a China-Africa Community with a Shared Future in the New Era”.

Source: AIM