Category: Commodities

China Launches Investigation Into Beef Imports

China's commerce ministry launched an investigation into imported beef on Friday at the request of representatives from its struggling domestic industry. The local price of beef in China has trended downwards in recent years, with analysts blaming oversupply and a lack ...

The Good News, Bad News About Uganda’s Trade With China

Chinese trade with Uganda has more than doubled over the past ten years from $600 million to $1.3 billion, according to Zhang Lizhong, China's ambassador to the East African country. While that is undoubtedly encouraging, the figures conceal a much deeper ...

Trade Numbers Reveal Africa-China Sticking Points

New Africa-China trade figures released by China’s General Administration of Customs reveal a low-energy trade relationship hemmed in by structural constraints. The Chinese authorities tried to put a happy face on it by emphasizing the 1.5% increase in trade (to a total ...

23 Tons of Kenyan Avocados Sold Out on the Day They Arrived in Hunan Province

Kenyan avocados are once again flowing into the Chinese market, but not soon enough for many buyers who snapped 23 tons of the fruit that arrived last month in the Hunan capital of Changsha in central China. Changsha is fast emerging ...

Fun Fact: China’s Unexpected Corn Boom

Many would be surprised to hear the results of new research showing that China now produces more corn than rice. And its need for biofuels, starches and animal feed is so big it also imports huge amounts from other corn producers like Brazil.

Analysis from Cobus van Staden

China-Led Study Proposes Global Energy Network

A globally connected network of solar and wind energy could provide three times the global energy demand by 2050 at a lower cost than independent national power systems. This is the finding of a study led by the Chinese Academy of Sciences in collaboration with researchers from the United States and Denmark.

The study focused on how areas with high solar and wind capacity (such as deserts) can be linked to ...

Commodity Exporters in Developing Countries Fret as China’s Worsening COVID Outbreaks, Protests Prompts Sell-Off

Commodity sellers in Africa, the Middle East and the Americas are becoming increasingly anxious over the situation in China, where days of street protests and COVID outbreaks across the country are weighing down the price of their key exports.

Star Power Boosts Rwandan Coffee in Online Sales Session

The famous Chinese actress Liu Tao recently hosted a live sale of Rwandan coffee on Alibaba’s e-commerce website Taobao. She sold 500kg of coffee beans in 5 minutes. It usually takes two to three months to sell that much on e-commerce sites. These ...

Nigerian Garment Union Calls Out Local Officials in Fight Against Cheap Chinese Imports

Nigeria’s national union of textile workers is complaining about the complicity of customs officials in the flooding of the local market by Chinese textiles. While cheap imports from China have long been blamed for undercutting the local garment sector, the National Union of Textile, Garment, and Tailoring ...

China’s Australia Tensions a Win for South African Wines 

South Africa doubled its exports of wine to China last year, following the souring of relations between Beijing and its biggest wine seller, Australia. While we’ve seen sporadic reports of how Western Cape wine farmers are leaning into their ...

Almost 2/3 of Africa’s Exports to China Last Year Came From Just Three Countries

The highly distorted nature of China-Africa trade in 2021 was the subject of a series of compelling charts and infographics published on Tuesday by the online financial news site Quartz. African exports, in particular, stood out. Only three ...

Rwanda’s Ambassador to China is Becoming an Innovative Pitchman for His Country’s Coffee Industry

If African countries are going to close their gaping trade deficits with China they'll have to find new ways to sell more of their goods to Chinese consumers. And James Kimonyo thinks he knows how. Kimonyo, Rwanda's Ambassador to China, is emerging ...

Uganda’s Museveni Calls on China to Grant Full Duty-Free Access For African Products

Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni called on China to further expand duty-free access to its vast market for African products. In a wide-ranging interview with Bloomberg News, the president acknowledged that China does already provide some tax-free privileges to African products, but now he'd like ...
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