Charts listing China’s top sources of imported oil used to look very different. In 2008, according to David Shinn from George Washington University, three suppliers from African dominated the top ten. At that stage Angola, the Republic of Congo, and Sudan accounting for a third of all Chinese imports.
Today, Angola remains the only African country in the top ten and its share of the China market has been steadily falling as Chinese buyers have shifted to Russia and Persian Gulf countries.
This trend provides essential context for why this week’s meetings in Beijing between the foreign ministers from China, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Kuwait, and Iran are so important.
