The Illegal ivory trade, is a quite contentious issues in Africa-China relations. There are merely and estimated 470,000 elephants remaining on the African continent today, a sharp decline from 1.2 million in 1981. Poaching of elephants for their ivory is a key driver of this crisis, with about 20-30 thousand elephants each year killed. Data from t…

The G20 Summit, an international forum for governments and central bank leaders of the world's 20 largest economies, is being held for the first time in China on September 4 and 5. Since China is the host and assumes the mantle of the G20 presidency, its government has an active role in crafting the Summit agenda. The theme of the Summit focuses on…

China’s complicated relationship with wildlife trade does the country no favors in regard to its international standing, despite a slow and steady attempt by the country to improve its regulatory environment in regards to ivory, rhino horn, and more. While much of the world frets over what the Chinese government is doing, there is a startling lack …

At the 4th Chinese in Africa/Africans in China Conference, held in Nairobi, Cowries and Rice and the Sino Africa Centre for Excellence Foundation found time to interview one of the greatest Chinese diplomats who helped shape the China-Africa relationship - Amb. Shu Zhan, China's former ambassador to Eritrea and Rwanda and unsung architect behind th…

At the 4th Chinese in Africa/Africans in China Conference, held in Nairobi, Kenya, Cowries and Rice teamed up with the China Africa Project and the Sino Africa Centre of Excellence Foundation to produce a rare triple-podcast looking at the role of media in knowledge production in the Sino-Africa relationship.…

Technology transfer is one of the most potentially beneficial aspects of the China-Africa relationship, but how many training centers, visits to China, etc. actually deliver on that promise? June Sun, who is a MPhil candidate at University of Oxford's Oxford Department of International Development (ODID) where she studies international development …

More and more Africans in China are sharing their experiences with the outside world on their own terms. Blogs, videos, songs, etc. are springing up all over the internet to give testimony to their experiences. We are fortunate to have on the pod Shubila Ruth Kikoko, who is pursing a PhD Strategic and Risk Management at Wuhan University of Technolo…

The Sixth Forum on China-Africa Cooperation was held in Johannesburg in December of last year. which resulted in China pledging $60 billion in mostly loans and export credits to the countries of Africa. On July 29, delegations from 51 African countries met in Beijing for the Coordinators' Meeting on the Implementation of the Follow-up Actions of th…

The Sicomines deal is one of China's largest "minerals for infrastructure" deals in Africa as well as one of its least understood. China Exim Bank extended $6 billion worth of credit to a Chinese consortium, called Sicomines, that would have mineral rights to Katanga province in the Democratic Republic of Congo. However, the deal was initially wort…

In this episode, we go back to a topic we have previously discussed at Cowries and Rice yet one that we judge timely and important enough to revisit: Sustainable development. Both sustainable development and developing sustainably seem to be important slogans for China - Africa relations and reflect Chinese policy priorities. In order to further lo…

This pod is an excuse to speak with Lily Kuo, who we have been following for quite some time. There is a good chance that, if you are listening to this podcast, you have had the pleasure of reading Ms. Kuo's brilliant reporting, whether on Chinese hackers in Kenya or Zimbabwean elephants headed for China. She is one of the few journalists in the wo…

Today's episode is going to focus on the Golden relations between Ghana and China, specifically around mining. To discuss this topic, we are inviting Prof. Yang Jiao on the pod. Prof. Jiao earned his doctorate in cultural anthropology from the University of Florida where he worked on the topic of mining. He is currently a visiting assistant profess…

A lot of China-Africa research is done through onsite interview, but what are the strengths of limitations of that kind of research - that is to say, how do people on the ground produce the knowledge they share with researchers and scholars? To help us answer that question, we have invited on the pod Derek Sheridan, a PhD Candidate at the Watson In…

ALERT: This is a Mandarin-language episode.To celebrate the Chinese New Year of the fire monkey, Cowries and Rice brings to you a a very special edition of the pod. Host Yiting Wang asks five Chinese guests to share with the listeners how they spent their New Year’s Eve and Day as well as their new year plans in their respective African countries, …

If you are an individual African entrepreneur, what sort of organizations are available to you to help navigate the Africa-China relationship? There are a number of friendship societies, often initiated by ex-diplomats, and trade associations, but today we wanted to highlight a young and dynamic non-profit involved in in this field: the Sino Africa…

If you are listening to this podcast, there is a good chance that you have heard of Prof. Deborah Brautigam and her research - "The Dragon's Gift: The Real Story of China in Africa" published in 2010 by the Oxford University Press is, for a lot of young scholars, the gateway by which they became interested in Africa-China affairs. However, not near…

President Xi Jinping's first overseas trip of 2016 was to Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Iran. Between January 19th to the 24th, Xi visited each country and signed dozens of agreements worth billions, although as is always the case with China-Africa numbers, those amounts should be taken with a grain of salt. Still, it was deft diplomacy to visit both Sa…

What is the role of the African entrepreneur on the African continent in the Sino-Africa relationship? To answer that question first-hand, hosts Winslow Robertson and Lina Benabdallah have invited Norbert Haguma on the pod. Haguma is: CEO of the AfrOrient Group, a one stop solution for any Asia-Africa project which was established in Hong Kong in 2…

Hosts Winslow Robertson, Lina Benabdallah, and Yiting Wang look at the lives of Chinese wholesalers in Uganda with Dr. Ward Warmerdam, who received his PhD from the international Institute of Social Studies (ISS) in the Hague and is an economic researcher at Profundo. Most recently, he has been working on Chinese wholesalers in Kampala, but his res…

Over the past few months, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in China has put out two phenomenal Sino-Africa reports: the 2015 Report on the Sustainable Development of Chinese Enterprises Overseas, co-authored by the Chinese Academy of International Trade and Economic Cooperation under the Ministry of Commerce and the Research Center o…

The Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) just ended on December 4-5 in Johannesburg, South Africa. For historical context, FOCAC was initiated in 2000 in Beijing in order to sketch out a three-year cooperation plan between China and the countries of Africa. Since then, the triennial meetings have alternated between China and an African country…

The Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) just ended on December 4-5 in Johannesburg, South Africa. For historical context, FOCAC was initiated in 2000 in Beijing in order to sketch out a three-year cooperation plan between China and the countries of Africa. Since then, the triennial meetings have alternated between China and an African country…

Prof. Deborah Brautigam is one of the foremost China-Africa scholars in the world, perhaps most famous for her 2010 book The Dragon's Gift: The Real Story of China in Africa, published by Oxford University Press. She is the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies' Bernard L. Schwartz Professor in International Political Economy, as w…

We are continuing to discuss the Sixth Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) for the rest of the month. FOCAC will be held in three weeks, December 4-5 in Johannesburg, South Africa. For historical context, FOCAC was initiated in 2000 in Beijing in order to sketch out a three-year cooperation plan between China and the countries of Africa. Sinc…

Note: This episode was recorded live in a cafe, and has considerable ambient noise which we were unable to remove. In addition, we could not properly edit in a typical intro, recommendation, and contact section for all the speakers and hope to add them in at a later date.We are continuing to discuss the Sixth Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCA…

Note: This episode was recorded live over lunch, and has considerable ambient noise which we were unable to remove.We are continuing to discuss the Sixth Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) for the rest of the month. FOCAC will be held in three weeks, December 4-5 in Johannesburg, South Africa. For historical context, FOCAC was initiated in 2…

We are continuing to discuss the Sixth Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) for the rest of the month. FOCAC will be held in three weeks, December 4-5 in Johannesburg, South Africa. For historical context, FOCAC was initiated in 2000 in Beijing in order to sketch out a three-year cooperation plan between China and the countries of Africa. Sinc…

South Africa is hosting the sixth Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) this December. FOCAC was initiated in the year 2000 and in Beijing in order to sketch out a three-year cooperation plan between China and the countries of Africa. Since then, the triennial meetings have alternated between China and an African country - and this time, will m…

The Chinese in Africa/Africans in China Research Network aims to strengthen and widen the reach of emerging cross-regional communities of research and practice in the area of China-Africa studies. Originally established in 2007 as a small research working group at the Centre for Sociological Research, at the University of Johannesburg, the Research…

On Wednesday October 7, 2015, Yang Feng Glan, a 66-year-old Chinese restaurant owner in Dar es Salaam station and vice-president and secretary-general of the Tanzania China-Africa business council, appeared in a Tanzanian court to be charged with smuggling ivory between 2000 and 2014. Media reports have dubbed her the "Ivory Queen" and the Elephant…

Note: This episode was recorded last year and is missing some content. It has been uploaded as the podcast is relaunching.Clean cookstoves are cooking instruments designed to save fuel, improve health, empower women, and protect the environment. They are rarely mentioned in the same breath as China-Africa relations, but in this episode, host Winslo…

Note: This episode was recorded last year and is missing some content. It has been uploaded as the podcast is relaunching.No discussion of China-Zambia relations would be complete without examining the TAZARA railway, the Chinese foreign aid project designed to eliminate landlocked Zambia's economic dependence on Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) and South A…

Aly-Khan Satchu, CEO of Rich Management (http://rich.co.ke), interviews Howard French, author of "China's Second Continent: How a Million Migrants Are Building a New Empire in Africa", to discuss Chinese migration in Africa and Africa-China affairs broadly. This is a shortened version of the original interview from 2014, which we have been granted …

What did Michael Sata, the recently passed President of Zambia, mean to Zambians who had worked and lived in China, or even married Chinese people? Host Winslow Robertson asks returning guest Kumbukilani Phiri, who worked for a Chinese green energy company in Zambia, Sunshine Kaidi New Energy Group and speaks fluent Mandarin after studying Civil En…

We continue our discussion on China-Zambia relations following the death of President Michael Sata, and host Winslow Robertson wanted to look at what Sata meant to Zambian voters. He asked Mr. Kennedy Gondwe, a freelance journalist based in Lusaka who is an expert on Zambian politics and returning guest Solange Guo Chatelard, an associate at the Ma…

What does the unfortunate death of President Michael Sata, who passed away on Wednesday October 29 due to an undisclosed illness, mean for the China-Zambia relationship? Host Winslow Robertson asked Ms. Hannah Postel on the pod to help enlighten him. Ms. Postel, a graduate of Middlebury College who specializes in economic development, migration, an…

The Africa-China relationship is pretty smooth when you have the Export-Import Bank of China or the China Development Bank throwing billions of dollars in your direction. However, not everyone involved in the relationship is so lucky. In this episode, host Winslow Robertson speaks to an individual Chinese entrepreneur, Liang Zhang, who is a travel …

There are a variety of media outlets interested in the Africa-China relationship, and in this episode host Winslow Robertson wanted to discuss how these outlets look at the relationship. James Schneider was the Editor-in-Chief of Think Africa Press and is currently the Editorial Director at New African Magazine. He read Theology at the University o…

Former President of Tanzania Benjamin Mkapa was recently at Zhejiang Normal University’s Institute of African Studies and the China-Africa Business College. He delivered a lecture, titled “Unscrambling Africa in the New Millennium,” that was attended by an American Fullbright scholar Zander Rounds. Rounds wrote about that speech on his blog "Bridgi…

The Dalai Lama was recently supposed to visit the 14th World Peace Summit, to be held in South Africa, yet his visa to the country was, for all practical purposes, denied. Dr. Ross Anthony looked at the issue on the Center for Chinese Studies' Commentary: "China, South Africa and the Dalai Lama: costs and benefits" and host Winslow Robertson invite…

China has a little-known program equivalent to the U.S. Peace Corps: the unofficially titled Chinese Youth Volunteers in Africa. Wendy Wang, a Business Development and Communications Officer with China House, explained this program to host Winslow Robertson. If you want to know about this program, how it is administered, how the volunteers are recr…

On September 18, 2014, AfricanDevJobs(africandevjobs.com) and Cowries and Rice (cowriesrice.blogspot.com) co-hosted the panel: "China & Development in Africa: What China's engagement with Africa means for the development sector & professionals".This moderated panel discussion explored how China’s engagement in Africa affects growth and development …

Host Winslow Robertson continues his discussion with Ms. Marina Rudyak and Mr. Christian Straube on the Chinese white paper on foreign aid, released on July 10 of this. If you want to find out if Hu Jintao might be purged soon based on a VERY close reading of this document, or if you want to know more about the often opaque world of Chinese aid, th…

The latest Chinese white paper on foreign aid was released on July 10. Looking at Chinese foreign assistance from 2010 to 2012, the paper reveals that China has given a cumulative total of $14.4 billion, half of which went to Africa. To get some more context on the white paper itself as well as the rhetoric behind the white paper, host Winslow Robe…

Part two of our discussion with Kenny Dong, a Master's student of Environmental Management at Kyoto University who is studying the environmental impact of Chinese companies in East Africa, has him explain his research regarding the Chinese Communications Construction Company in Kenya. If you want to learn more about Chinese environmental standards …

If you are listening to this podcast, you are no doubt well-acquainted with the research of Prof. Deborah Brautigam, having read "The Dragon's Gift: The Real Story of China in Africa" or her wonderful blog "China in Africa: The Real Story." However, did you know that Prof. Brautigam has started a new, exciting Sino-Africa research initiative? On to…

Host Winslow Robertson continues his discussion of the excellent "China's Second Continent: How a Million Migrants Are Building a New Empire in Africa" with its author, Prof. Howard W. French. French is associate professor at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, where he teaches reporting, writing, and a spring seminar each year o…

The excellent "China's Second Continent: How a Million Migrants Are Building a New Empire in Africa" was just released to rave reviews last month. This phenomenal Africa-China book looks at China's engagement with Africa through the prism of Chinese immigration to the continent. In order to further explore some of these themes, host Winslow Roberts…

Hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu continue their conversation with Jenni Marsh, who just wrote a brilliant article at South China Morning Post's Post Magazine: "Afro-Chinese marriages boom in Guangzhou: but will it be 'til death do us part'?" We ask about what struck her most about the relationships encountered, what will these relation…

As more Africans set up shop in Guangzhou, there has been a corresponding increase in Afro-Chinese marriages. Hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu talked to Jenni Marsh, who just wrote a brilliant article at South China Morning Post's Post Magazine on that very topic: "Afro-Chinese marriages boom in Guangzhou: but will it be 'til death do …