Category: Infrastructure

The small Atlantic Ocean island state of Cabo Verde appears to be taking on a much larger role within the burgeoning U.S.-China rivalry in Africa. On Tuesday, in just his fourth call to an African counterpart, the new U.S. Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, spoke by phone ...

The Nigerian Debt Management Office on Monday revealed that it has $5.8 billion of borrowed money on its books that it hasn't disbursed. This prompted new worries among some financial analysts that the actual debt-to-GDP ratio has surpassed 100%, meaning that the country has taken on so ...

There's new evidence of the dramatic plunge in Chinese overseas development finance. Researchers in the United States found that for the first time in more than a decade, China's two largest policy banks, the China Development Bank and the China Exim Bank, did not ...

The recent striking images of Texans stuck in freezing temperatures without electricity and queueing for water were hard to process.  I felt much solidarity with them, especially when a blackout in Johannesburg made it impossible for me to join Eric ...

Kenya's parliament approved funds to extend the Standard Gauge Railway from Naivasha in the Rift Valley all the way to Malaba on the border with Uganda. Several years ago, this extension was known as "SGR Phase 3." President Uhuru Kenyatta's requests for the financing of this phase ...

The China Road and Bridge Corporation is building a massive new half-a-billion dollar expressway right through the Kenyan capital of Nairobi. But this project is very different than previous Chinese-financed infrastructure initiatives in Kenya, like the ailing Standard ...

The Kenyan government, like a lot of African governments, is struggling to find the right balance between continuing to pay for badly-needed new infrastructure while at the same time servicing its enormous debts for older projects -- many of which are now so-called "white elephants" that were ...

A trio of scholars in China recently published an academic paper in the Journal of Contemporary China that included a much more detailed map of China's Belt & Road trade routes in Asia than previously available. One of the key takeaways from the ...

China's Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) released some updated figures last week on trade with Africa that tell a much more positive story than many would have assumed, given the sizable economic disruptions brought on by the COVID-19 outbreak. Total two-way trade ...

There's widespread speculation that Chinese financial support for its hugely ambitious Belt and Road Initiative may be waning due to the current economic crisis and the desire among senior Chinese policymakers to focus more attention on the domestic front. ...

Chinese Foreign Minister kicked off a four-nation tour of Southeast Asia in Myanmar on Monday where he met with newly re-elected President Win Myint (photo) and Aung Sang Suu Kyi, the de facto head of the government and leader of the ruling National League for Democracy party. ...

Visiting Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi met with Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari on Tuesday before leaving for the Democratic Republic of the Congo as part of the FM's five-nation week-long Africa tour. The meeting seemed upbeat,