Related Posts

Critical Minerals Weekly: China’s Rare Earth Reset, Copper Overcapacity, and Zimbabwe’s Big Lithium Gamble

This is a free preview of the upcoming Critical Minerals Weekly Digest, part of the new CGSP Intelligence service launching in Summer 2025. After months of strategic restrictions, China has agreed to resume rare earth exports to the U.S. as ...

Model Meets Reality: The Africa–China Export Forecast That Delivered

In an era where economic uncertainty often renders forecasts obsolete before they materialize, Africa’s export performance to China between 2022 and 2026 stands out as a compelling exception. Projections that I made together with Professor Reon Matemane, an associate professor at the University of Pretoria, in ...

The New Realities About Chinese Development Finance in Africa

Chinese overseas development finance is unrecognizable from what it was just a few years ago. After suffering tens of billions of dollars in losses, Chinese lenders have moved to de-risk their lending to countries in Africa, Asia, and across the Global ...

China, the U.S., and the Competition for Africa’s Strategic Resources

Southern Africa has become a focal point of geopolitical competition, with the U.S., China, and other global powers maneuvering for influence over key infrastructure projects and critical resources. The Lobito Corridor Project, a railway and logistics ...

What does Trump 2.0 Offer to Africa?

By Cobus van Staden As the world shifts into gear for the next Trump term, striking new polling results have revealed a split in opinion about the incoming president. An opinion survey of ...

Analysis from Cobus van Staden

BRICS Announces Numerous New Initiatives

The BRICS group wrapped up its two-day leaders’ summit in Rio de Janeiro on Monday. The summit’s final communique is a 16,000-word doorstop that covers numerous issues from economics to education.
The communique avoids any direct mention of the United States, and references to “unilateralism” and other coded criticism are also relatively scarce. Rather, the communique keeps the focus on the BRICS’ vision of the strengthening and reform of the global multilateral system ...

No, the Lobito Corridor is NOT a U.S. Project

U.S. President Joe Biden finally made his long-postponed trip to Angola, fulfilling his December 2022 promise to visit Africa. When the promise was initially made, there were expectations of a more substantial visit—perhaps including multiple countries—not just a single stop as a “lame duck.”

Fact-Checking International Media Coverage of Biden’s Africa Tour

Joe Biden wrapped up a three-day trip to Cabo Verde and Angola this week, marking the first visit by a sitting U.S. President to Africa in almost ten years. Although Biden sought to lay out an expansive vision for U.S. foreign ...

Biden Administration Grabs Last Chance to Push Debt Trap Narrative

U.S. President Joe Biden argued on Wednesday that the United States is striving to be a qualitatively different investor from China in Africa. In making this case, administration officials couldn’t resist one last reference to a meme cherished by Democrats and ...

Biden Hails ‘Game Changer’ Africa Investment on Angola Visit

By Aurélia End Joe Biden on Wednesday lauded a landmark railway infrastructure project aimed at countering China's investments in Africa as a "game changer" while on a historic first visit to Angola by a US president.

In Angola, Biden Promises to Invest Differently to China

President Joe Biden will make the case on Wednesday in Angola that the United States must do better rather than more than China to regain influence in Africa. Biden is on the second day of a visit to the African country, ...

Biden Announces $1 Billion for Africa During Maiden Trip

By Aurélia End U.S. President Joe Biden on Tuesday announced more than $1 billion in humanitarian assistance to Africa during a visit to Angola, where the United States is showcasing a major infrastructure project aimed at countering China's investments on the ...

China Will Be on Everyone’s Mind When Biden Visits Angola This Week

Joe Biden boarded Air Force One late Sunday night, bound for West Africa in what will likely be the outgoing U.S. president's final overseas trip before he leaves office next month. The President will travel to Angola with a brief stopover ...
Page 1 of 141214