Impact Of The Belt And Road Initiative On The Trade And Investment Between China And Africa

In recent years,with the gradual expansion of the Belt and Road Initiative(BRI),the BRI cooperation between China and Africa has developed rapidly:as of August 2022,52 African countries and African Union have signed the cooperation document,accounting for approximately one-third of all participants.In addition,being the key component of the BRI,the trade and investment is also the rapidly growing area of economic cooperation between China and Africa.However,the impact of the BRI on trade and investment between China and Africa has been less studied in the academic world.Especially in the context of global economic development facing the challenges of economic cycles and Covid-19,it is important for China,Africa,and the world to evaluate the effect of the BRI on the trade and investment cooperation between China and Africa to further achieve win-win development.In view of the above,this paper collects bilateral trade data between China and 54 African countries from 2010 to 2020,as well as China’s FDI in African countries and relevant data from the database of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development(UNCTAD),Statistical Bulletins of China’s Outward Foreign Direct Investment,the World Development Indicators and World Governance Indicators database.Then,this paper uses the Event Study Analysis and the Time-varying Difference-in-difference methods to study the impact of BRI on China’s trade and investment with Africa.The results of the empirical analysis show that:(1)in terms of import and export trade structure,the dynamic effect of the BRI on China’s imports from African countries has an obvious upward trend,while the dynamic effect of the BRI on China’s exports to African countries is relatively stable.(2)In terms of commodity structure,the results of the Time-varying Difference-in-difference model show that the BRI has led to a decrease in China’s exports of primary products to Africa,and the effect remains significant after the placebo tests,implying that the BRI has promoted the upgrading of China’s export commodity structure to Africa.However,the BRI has no significant impact on the upgrading of Africa’s export commodity structure.Further heterogeneity analysis reveals that the impact of BRI differs between coastal and landlocked African countries.(3)In terms of China’s direct investment in Africa,the BRI has led to a significant increase on China’s FDI.Based on the research findings,the paper concludes with relevant policy recommendations to help promote the BRI and China-Africa cooperation to high quality,high efficiency and high-level.