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G7’s Global Infrastructure Initiative Will Have to Contend With China’s Massive Lead in Africa

by Cliff Mboya
The new $129 million international terminal in Zanzibar that was built and financed by China. The project was supposed to take 18 months to complete but instead required nine years.

The recent announcement of an initiative to rival China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) has generated a lot of debate among scholars and policyholders trying to understand its feasibility, particularly in Africa. What is not in doubt is that the G7’s Build Back Better World (B3W) plan is up against a formidable rival with a substantial lead.

Veda Vaidyanathan, a visiting associate fellow at the Institute of Chinese Studies in New Delhi, led a team of researchers to analyze five Chinese-built infrastructure projects in Kenya and Tanzania in the telecommunications, energy, and transportation sectors. 

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