Adapting Chinese solutions to Africa

Technical and vocational skills development is considered a way to develop appropriate job competency and thereby improve labor supply and the employability of the workforce. Consequently, developing these skills has assumed some prominence in the fight against youth unemployment.

To a common beat

As a more confident and assertive China has laid the foundations for a fresh approach to diplomacy over the past year, it and its partners in Africa have been keen to pursue goals for their relationships that President Xi Jinping set out in 2013.

Zhou Enlai set the tone for bilateral ties

At the start of last year, China-Africa relations were on a high, particularly given that both Gambia and Sao Tome had severed links with Taipei in late 2013 and recognized Beijing. China now in effect has diplomatic relations with 54 out of 55 countries in Africa, and a brick and mortar presence in all of these countries.

Year in which solidarity became clearer

Last year brought what might be called a new normal in the development of China-Africa relations.

Maritime Silk Road shows way forward

An "inflection point" in mathematics occurs when there is a change of curvature, say from concave to convex, at a particular point on a curve.

Growth pangs

This year begins in a climate of considerable global economic uncertainty.

2015 outlook

Stephen Roach, former chairman of Morgan Stanley Asia and author of Unbalanced: The Codependency of America and China

Tipping point

Investment flows in and out of a country do not usually excite much interest - but in the case of China, 2014 may prove an exception.

Cover story

A new era of investment in Africa

A scale weighing China's outward direct investments across the globe currently tilts heavily toward Asia, at a whopping 70 percent of total volume by 2013, most of which was poured into Hong Kong.

China's spending on fast track

This year is a milestone for outward direct investment from China. The nation's outward investment is predicted to match or exceed the foreign direct investment flowing into China's mainland from other countries and economies.

A year of growth, within and without

A call to promote exchanges between Chinese and African media by delegates at the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation held in 2012 in Beijing allowed me to land a prestigious opportunity to work and train in China for one year.