"China’s trade with Africa has jumped to top $50 bn this year, compared with just $11 bn in 2000, when Beijing and the African nations first announced their partnership. It’s expected to top $100 bn by 2010.

In the third China Africa summit concluded in early November, which was attended by 35 heads of African state, China has pledged to provide African nations with $ 3 bn in ‘soft’ loans in the next three years, $2 bn in credit, train 15,000 African professionals, establish trade and economic cooperation zones in Africa, and set up a China-Africa development fund of $3bn. China has doled out a whopping $5 bn in loans and credit, and promised to double aid by ’09.

It has not only cancelled $1.3 bn in African debt, it has extended a further $1bn debt to Angola. The Chinese authorities described the meeting as ‘historic’, something they’re unlikely to say about the visit to India. 16 deals between Chinese companies and African nations, worth a total of $1.9 bn, in areas such as infrastructure, telecom, technological equipment, mineral resource development and insurance have also been signed.

What concerns the western world is not just that Chinese companies are digging into the potentially huge African market, but also fears that China may gobble up some of the world’s richest oil reserves, to fuel its ever-growing appetite.

Especially since China’s publicly avowed intention of ‘offering a helping hand’ to Africa means that it is not attaching any strings — read providing capital to authoritarian regimes — to its loans. What’s leading to rising concern in the West, both in government and energy circles, is that China, which is the world’s second largest consumer of energy, has quietly drilled its claim deep into some of the world’s most oil-rich nations. In ’05, China extended a $2 bn package of oil-backed loans to Angola, sub-Saharan Africa’s second largest petroleum producer after Nigeria."

Source: Economic Times "China miles ahead of India in Africa" by Sudeshna Sen 11-23-06