Cowries and Rice: Recent Episodes
Winslow Robertson
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 the Convention on International Trade of Endangered Species or CITES shows that China is a major market for this ivory.
There are reasons to be optimistic however. In September 2015, Chinese President Xi Jinping and U.S. President Barrack Obama jointly committed to enact nearly complete bans on ivory import and export. During the eighth session of the U.S.-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue back in June of this year, China announced that it will set a timetable to phase out commercial trading in ivory by the end of 2016. We actually discussed on episode 62 that one of outcomes of the Forum on China Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) were strong pledges by China to help curb poaching activities in Africa. Today we bring back to the pod Mr. Zhou Fei, head of TRAFFIC, the wildlife trade research network, to discuss a brand new report titled “An Act to Save African Elephants: A Ban on Commercial Ivory Trade in China: A Feasibility Study Briefing.”
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 three core concepts "innovation, integration, and inclusion" and the areas of priority include: the implementation of the Paris Agreement on climate change (which was just formally adopted by China and the U.S. on September 3), creating and implementing entrepreneurship action plans, as well as supporting industrialization of Africa - which is of great interest to this pod.
There are 4 African countries participating at the Summit and Africa's industrialization is a topic that China insisted on putting in the Summit agenda. To talk more about the place/role of Africa in the Summit and the role of China-Africa relations in shaping China's leadership for the G20, we are bringing back to the Pod, Dr. Sven Grim. Dr. Grimm is a political scientist who has worked on external partners’ cooperation with Africa since 1999. He is a Senior Researcher and the Coordinator of the Rising Powers program at The German Development Institute (DIE) in Bonn. Since 2006 his research has focused on emerging economies’ role in Africa, and specifically China-Africa relations. He earned his PhD from Hamburg University in 2002 with a thesis on E.U.-Africa relations. He has previously worked with the London-based Overseas Development Institute (ODI) and was the former head of the Centre for Chinese Studies at Stellenbosch University in Cape Town, South Africa.
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 of attention on the role of Chinese individuals in helping combat illegal wildlife. China House, a client of mine and the first Chinese social enterprise in Africa, is organizing a Color Run in Kenya to take place on August 28 to not only raise awareness among Chinese youth regarding this issue, but also to show Chinese and Kenyan support for stronger ivory regulations in the upcoming Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (or CITES) 17th meeting of the Conference of the Parties, which will take place in Johannesburg, South Africa from September 24th to October 5th, 2016. To talk about the event, we have on the pod Winnie Wong, the Communications Manager for China House (Full Disclosure: China House is a client of Cowries and Rice) as well as one of the organizers behind the event. If you want to understand how Chinese youth are trying to change hearts and minds, this episode is for you.
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 the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC). If you ever wanted to know about the arc of China-Africa relations from the side of China's diplomats, or even how FOCAC started in the first place, this episode is for you.
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 joins us to discuss that topic. She recently authored a Policy Brief on that subject for the Johns Hopkins' School of Advanced International Studies' China-Africa Research Initiative entitled "Technology Transfer in Telecommunications: Barriers and Opportunities in the case of Huawei and ZTE in South Africa."
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 Technology whose memoir "Incubated in China" will be released in August of 2016. This book chronicles her journey from Tanzania to China and will be an incredible resource for anyone that is researching African students in China.
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 the Johannesburg Summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (or FOCAC). Having a follow-up meeting to discuss the particulars of FOCAC implementation is a step common to all FOCAC meetings. In order to talk about this step we have invited back on the pod Dr. Tang Xiaoyang, Deputy Director of the Carnegie-Tsinghua Center for Global Policy and an associate professor in the Department of International Relations at Tsinghua University. He is the author of the book China-Africa Economic Diplomacy (2014). Prior to Tsinghua, Dr. Tang work for the International Food Policy Research Institute in Washington, DC. He also worked as a consultant for the World Bank, the U.S. Agency for International Development. He also has coauthored a number of publications with Prof. Deborah Brautigam of the SAIS China-Africa Research Initiative, most recently “‘Going Global in Groups’: Structural Transformation and China’s Special Economic Zones Overseas,” World Development.
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 worth $9 billion and required a renegotiation as the International Monetary Fund argued that a Congolese debt-reduction plan could not include Sicomines due to the structure of the loans. Dr. Johanna Malm just earned her PhD from Roskilde University and joins us again on Cowries and Rice to discuss Sicomines - except that her dissertation argues that the IMF portrayed the $ 3 billion infrastructure loan within this particular agreement as a cheaper concessional loan, whilst in fact it was a significantly more expensive commercial loan. This was to ensure that the DRC could continue the debt relief process that was blocked by Sicomines - “For political reasons, the IMF also needed to downplay the challenge posed by the Chinese loan to the organisation’s debt limits framework."
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 look into questions of the impact of development on the environment and Corporate Social Responsibility practices by Chinese firms abroad in general and in Africa more specifically, we have invited to the pod Ms. Xiaoxue Weng who is a researcher in International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED)'s Natural Resources Group.
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 world with a China-Africa beat. Ms. Kuo covers East Africa and China in Africa from Nairobi for Quartz. She previously reported for Quartz from Hong Kong. Before that she covered general news for Reuters in New York and the Los Angeles Times in Beijing. She holds a dual master’s degree in international affairs from the London School of Economics and Peking University, as well as degrees in English and Spanish from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She won the 2014 SABEW award for best international feature for a series on China's water crisis.
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 professor at the University of Miami in Ohio where he teaches anthropology and continues to do China-Africa research.
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 Institute for International & Public Affairs at Brown University. Mr. Sheridan' dissertation research looks at the China-Africa relationship from the perspective of people involved in the micro-politics of different forms of Chinese business in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania: the formation of interpersonal relationships, negotiations over the value of both people and the commodities exchanged between them, and the everyday production of knowledge regarding Tanzania, Africa and China’s place in the world. He just presented his research at the Harvard East Asian Studies Conference.
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, all in Mandarin. First on the pod are: Sun Chuyi from China Minmetals Inc. in Johannesburg, South Africa; Yang Bo from AVIC International in Nairobi, Kenya; and Zhuyang Zhenghong from CITIC Construction in Yaoundé, Cameroon. In the follwing segment, two Fellows from the Nairobi-based social China House – Li Huizhen and Lu Kaili join us to share their stories.
为庆祝中国农历猴年新年，Cowries and Rice特别为听众朋友们带来一期中文播客。主持人王怡婷与五位洒落在非洲各地的中国小伙伴畅谈他们在非洲过年的体验以及新年计划等话题。首先来到节目的是在南非约翰内斯堡工作的中国五矿集团的孙楚宜，在中航国际驻肯尼亚内罗毕的杨博，和中信建设驻喀麦隆雅温得的朱杨正宏。接下来，我们有请到中南屋的李慧珍和陆凯丽来分享关于中南屋伙伴的迎春活动和最新动态。
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 Centre of Excellence (SACE) Foundation. Based in Nairobi, Kenya, they aim to to facilitate China-Africa trade and investment through three pillars: SACE Research Hub, SACE Projects, and Business Advisory Services in partnership with Botho Limited. You might remember them from their publication China Business Perception Index: Survey on Chinese Companies’ Perception of Doing Business in Kenya, which was published last year. To talk more about this foundation and how it serves African entrepreneurs as a whole, we have invited Adedana Ashebir to the pod, who is the SACE Foundation's Africa Business Development Lead.
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 nearly as many people are aware of Prof. Brautigam's research center, the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies' China-Africa Research Initiative (SAIS CARI) and we want to remedy that, so hosts Winslow Robertson and Lina Benabdallah (Yiting Wang is sadly absent) invited Janet Eom on the pod. Ms. Eom is the Research Manager at SAIS CARI, and previously she researched the impact on society, environment, and labor relations of Chinese activity in Africa at the Carnegie-Tsinghua Center for Global Policy in Beijing. She discusses the SAIS CARI post-doctoral research fellow position and other opportunities for researchers as well as the vision for the Initiative on this episode.
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 Saudi Arabia and Iran in the same trip, considering they are mortal enemies. In addition, Xi's visit to Egypt was significant: the country is supposed to be major artery for One Belt One Road, and also Egypt was the first African country to recognize China in 1956 - so President Xi and Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi attended a celebration marking the 60th anniversary of those relations at the opening ceremony of the Sino-Egyptian Culture Year in 2016. To talk about the Xi's visit and China-Middle East relations more broadly, we have on this episode: Lina Benabdallah, a PhD candidate at the department of Political Science and Center for African studies at the University of Florida, whose research looks into the dynamics of vocational trainings and power diffusion in China-Africa relations (and is the proud co-host of the Cowries and Rice podcast); and Evanna Hu, a previous guest of the pod who was CEO of g.Maarifa in Nairobi but has moved on to new projects and a new base in Amman, Jordan. She is a technologist specializing in mobile tech platforms and digital strategies, having done on-the-ground implementation in conflict zones, including stints in Afghanistan and Iraq, where she saw first-hand Chinese interests in those countries.
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 2009 and moved to Kigali in 2015; as well as Vice President of the Rwanda Diaspora Global Network. Haguma spent 10 years in China as a student, translator, consultant, IT engineer, and manager, but recently moved back to the African continent to leverage his considerable Sino-Africa expertise for the AfrOrient Group, leading trade and cultural delegations in Africa.
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 research broadly focuses on China’s engagement with Africa, the lessons from China’s own development experience, and how these inform China’s aid principles and practices. He has published “Having, Giving, Taking: Lessons on Ownership in China's Domestic Development and Contributions of its Engagement” Forum for Development Studies, 2013. Before embarking on his PhD studies, Dr. Warmerdam lived in China for 10 years running his own consultancy and language institute.
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 of the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration under the Commission of the State Council, which was released on November 9; and If Africa builds nests, will the birds come?: Comparative Study on Special Economic Zones in Africa and China, which was written in conjunction with the International Poverty Reduction Center in China and released on December 17. To talk about those reports, and for what UNDP China has planned for 2016, hosts Winslow Robertson, Lina Benabdallah, and Yiting Wang have invited on the pod Hannah Ryder, the Head of Policy and Partnerships for the UNDP in China, to the pod. She leads a group of national and international experts in UNDP to support China to cooperate practically and effectively with other countries and develop its positions on various key international issues, including the post-2015 development agenda, China’s climate change policy, and China’s development cooperation.
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. Hosts Winslow Roberson and Lina Benabdallah (Yiting Wang was unable to join) wanted to assess FOCAC's sustainability and environmental initiatives and brought back on the pod Ms. Li Nan and Ms. Louise Scholtz from the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) China and WWF South Africa respectively, as well as a new guest from TRAFFIC China. Ms. Li Nan is policy manager of China's Green Shift Initiative at WWF China; Mr. Zhou Fei: head of TRAFFIC China, the wildlife trade research network; and Ms. Louise Scholtz is manager for the policy futures unit at WWF South Africa.
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. Hosts Winslow Robertson, Lina Benabdallah, and Yiting Wang wanted to assess FOCAC in relation to the 2012 iteration and brought Dr. Bob Wekesa back on the pod to share his thoughts. Dr. Wekesa received his PhD in international communications at Communication University of China and is currently a Research Associate at University of the Witwatersrand in South Africa, as well as a founding research coordinator at the African Communication Research Centre at the same university. His journalism experience spans reporting, editing and leadership across multiple media platforms; in addition to numerous articles, Wekesa is the author of two books and his third, on China-Africa, is forthcoming.
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 well as Professor of International Development and Comparative Politics, and Director of the International Development Program and the China-Africa Research Initiative (SAIS CARI). She recently published a wonderful myth-busting book on China-Africa agriculture, titled "Will Africa Feed China?" and published again by Oxford University Press, which is available now for purchase. Hosts Winslow Robertson, Lina Benabdallah, and Yiting Wang, discuss Brautigam's book, her research, and how agriculture fit into the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC).
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. Since then, the triennial meetings have alternated between China and an African country. Hosts Winslow Robertson and Lina Benabdallah connect FOCAC to the idea of rising powers: what FOCAC means to South Africa and what these summits do for China as a member of the Global South, the developing world, or whichever nomenclature one may prefer. Joining them is Dr. Sven Grimm, a political scientist who has worked on external partners’ co-operation with Africa since 1999. He is a Senior Researcher and the Coordinator of the Rising Powers program at The German Development Institute (DIE) in Bonn. Since 2006 his research has focused on emerging economies’ role in Africa, and specifically China-Africa relations. He obtained his Ph.D. from Hamburg University in 2002 with a thesis on E.U.-Africa relations. He has previously worked with the London-based Overseas Development Institute (ODI) and was the former head of the Centre for Chinese Studies at Stellenbosch University in Cape Town, South Africa.
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 (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. Since then, the triennial meetings have alternated between China and an African country. Hosts Winslow Robertson and Lina Benabdallah managed to meet up with Prof. Tang Xiaoyang, Resident Scholar at the Carnegie–Tsinghua Center for Global Policy and an associate professor in the Department of International Relations at Tsinghua University, and Sun Yuzhou, an MA student in African Studies at the University of Oxford and asked them both to share their thoughts regarding the role of Chinese researchers in FOCAC. This was an impromptu podcast so please be aware it did not follow the typical format.
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 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. This week, hosts Winslow Robertson and Lina Benabdallah examine China-Africa security issues with Amb. David Shinn, who was U.S. ambassador to Ethiopia and Burkina Faso. He is currently an Adjunct Professor of International Affairs at The George Washington University's Elliott School of International Affairs, and co authored China and Africa: A Century of Engagement with Prof. Joshua Eisenman, which was published in 2012 by the University of Pennsylvania Press. In addition, he recently published a non-China-Africa book: Hizmet in Africa: The Activities and Significance of the Gulen Movement.
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. Since then, the triennial meetings have alternated between China and an African country. This week, hosts Winslow Robertson and Lina Benabdallah hope to discuss how how FOCAC will engage with sustainable development and have three guests from the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) Kenya, WWF China, and WWF South Africa respectively to explore the linkages between FOCAC and sustainable development: Jackson Kiplagat is the Interim Policy & Research Lead - Africa for WWF Kenya, Nan Li is Policy Program Manager for China's Green Shift Initiative at WWF China; and Louise Scholtz is Manager: Special Projects: Policy Futures Unit of WWF South Africa.
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 mark the first instance that FOCAC is held at a summit (instead of ministerial) level in an African country. To discuss FOCAC today as well as its media permutations, hosts Winslow Robertson (and Lina Benabdallah in spirit) invited Dr. Bob Wekesa on the show. Dr. Wekesa received his PhD in international communications at Communication University of China and is currently a Research Associate at University of the Witwatersrand in South Africa. He is a leading expert on all things relating to China-Africa media, and he actually attending the previous FOCAC in 2012, held in Beijing.
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 Network has grown rapidly to become a global network of researchers and practitioners. It provides a dynamic, virtual platform where members meet, debate, inquire, and stay in touch. Hosts Winslow Robertson and Lina Benabdallah (who are members of the Network) wanted to look at the Network's most recent outreach efforts and invited Dr. Tu Hyunh, who is the cofounder of the Network as well as a recent postdoctoral fellow at Jinan University on the pod to discuss these efforts.
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 Action League, an American NGO, described her as “the most important ivory trafficker ever arrested in the country.” Host Winslow Robertson and new cohost Lina Benabdallah are joined by Hongxiang Huang, owner and manager of the China-Africa social enterprise China House and expert on China-Africa ivory smuggling issues, to look closer at this story. Did Yang Feng Glan fit the proverbial profile of a Chinese ivory smuggler in Africa?
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 Winslow Robertson has two clean cookstove experts connect the two topics. Jichong Wu, China Program Manager at the United Nations Foundation and Yiting Wang, Program Development Manager at WWF-China, both share their histories with clean cookstoves as well as explain how those stoves fit into the China-Africa relationship.
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 Africa. Host Winslow Robertson asks Prof. Jamie Monson, Director of the Michigan State University's (famed) African Studies Center. Prof. Monson is author of the definitive TAZARA history text "Africa's Freedom Railway.
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 permission to post on this podcast. The original interview can be found here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cgNOkyZXD0Q.
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 Engineering in Guangxi university. He is uniquely situated to talk about the Zambia-China relationship, and we are delighted to having him on the pod again.
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 Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology in Halle/Saale, Germany. If you wanted to know about domestic Zambian politics, this is the episode for you!
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, and overseas Chinese communities, just returned to D.C. from her time as 2013-2014 Fulbright Scholar in Zambia and wants to share her reflections of President Sata.
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 consultant, bringing small Chinese tour groups to Morocco to experience the country and its culture. We discuss how he got started, why he chose Morocco, and why everyone should visit the country. If you want to learn more about a different side of the China-Africa relationship, please listen!
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 of Oxford and has a particular interest in the study of political economy, capital flows, and equitable development. Sam Piranty is a producer with the BBC and a recent recipient of a grant from the Wits China-Africa Reporting Project, which allowed him to learn and write about African communities in Guangzhou.
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 "Bridging the Great Wall: A research blog on African students in China" and we found his analysis fascinating and asked him to share his experiences.
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 invited him on the pod to discuss the Dalai Lama's relationship with South Africa in-depth. If you want to learn more about the Dalai Lama Debacle, which The Daily Maverick dubbed the incident, please listen to this episode!
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 recruited, how it is funded, and more, please listen to this episode!
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 in Africa and what that means for African development professionals. This event brought together China-Africa practitioners and voices in development to discuss the impacts of the China-Africa relationship in Africa.
The event featured:
Amb. David Shinn, Co-author, China and Africa: Century of Engagement
Kelley Page Jibrell, Faculty, Howard University
Jyhjong Hwang, Research Assistant, JHU SAIS China Africa Research Initiative
Winslow Robertson, Founder, Cowries and Rice
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, this episode is for you!
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 Robertson asked Ms. Marina Rudyak and Mr. Christian Straube to come on the pod. Ms. Rudyak holds an M.A. in Modern and Classical Chinese Studies and Public Law from the University of Heidelberg. After graduating in 2009 with a thesis on the People’s Republic of China’s energy security policy in Central Asia she worked in the Beijing office of the German Agency for International Cooperation (GIZ). In April 2014, she re-joined the Institute of Chinese studies as an assistant to pursue her PhD on Chinese foreign aid and China’s role in international development. Christian Straube is a PhD candidate at the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology, Germany. Mr. Straube runs the website http://www.christianstrau.be/ which looks at China's relations with copperbelt African countries. He also translates Chinese documents into English. They are lending their expertise to look carefully at the text of the white paper itself and its significance beyond the numbers.
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 in Kenya, how Chinese financing mechanisms work, and how to even do this sort of research, please listen!
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 today's episode, host Winslow Robertson asks Prof. Brautigam about the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) China Africa Research Initiative (CARI), which recently held its inaugural public conference: "China’s Agricultural Investment in Africa: ‘Land Grabs’ or ‘Friendship Farms’?" If you want to know what one of the top scholars in the Sino-Africa field is up to, or where the field is headed, you owe it to yourself to listen to this episode!
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 on contemporary China. In this episode, they discuss criticisms of the book as well as how French managed to interview so many diverse peoples.
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 Robertson (Dr, Nkemjika Kalu is sadly indisposed) discusses the book 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 on contemporary China. Prof. French also had a distinguished career with The New York Times, where he spent almost two decades as a foreign correspondent: He was chief of the newspaper's Shanghai bureau. Prior, he headed bureaus in Japan, West and Central Africa, Central America and the Caribbean. He also wrote "The Next Empire," a 2010 China-Africa article in The Atlantic. In addition, Prof. French wrote "A Continent for the Taking: The Tragedy and Hope of Africa" and "Disappearing Shanghai: Photographs and Poems of an Intimate Way of Life."
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 relationships mean for China's conception of race, and more.
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 us part'?" Marsh is Assistant Editor of Post Magazine at South China Morning Post in Hong Kong. She is currently researching the African diaspora in Guangzhou, China, with a grant from the University of Witwatersrand's China-Africa Reporting Project.
ALERT: This is a Mandarin-language episode! Host Andy Shuai Liu of China Open Mic spoke with China Going Out's Hongxiang Huang (who was a Cowries and Rice guest back in October of 2013) to talk about his newest project: China House. China House looks to help open-minded Chinese citizens integrate better with African societies and promote a more mutually beneficial Sino-African relationship. If you were curious as to what effective Chinese non-governmental organizations or corporate social responsibility would look like, please listen to this episode!
ALERT: This is a Mandarin-language episode! Jess Wilhelm, Senior Research Associate at Social & Scientific Systems, delivered a lecture on Chinese migrants in Lesotho based on his experiences as a Peace Corps Volunteer there. He spoke on April 17, 2014 at China Garden for the Mandarin Speakers Society. Carlos Da Rosa provided the introduction. We recorded the lecture, and Mr. Wilhelm was generous in offering to translate it, and his translation can be found at http://cowriesrice.blogspot.com.
Continuing from the previous discussion about China's involvement in African green energy, hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu ask PhD students Alexander Demissie and Moritz Weigel of ChinaAfricaBlog to delve further into their research. They talk about what has been most surprising, what they hope people will take away from the discussion, and more. This is part two of the two-part episode!
China is quite involved in African power infrastructure, but what about renewable energy? Hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu asked the good people at ChinaAfricaBlog, PhD students Alexander Demissie and Moritz Weigel, to discuss their latest research on the topic and give context as to what is China doing in terms of promoting green energy and technology. This is part one of a two-part episode!
PS We made a mistake in our discussion about Chinese 5-year-plans that I could not smoothly edit out. We accidentally said that they have been used since 1949, but In fact the first first 5-year-plan began in 1953. Apologies!
You specialized in China-African relations, so where is that dynamic, high-powered job that you were expecting? Isn't everyone interested in Sino-Africa relations and willing to pay for that expertise? Not quite. Hosts Dr. Nkemjika Kalu and Winslow Robertson asked the most successful China-Africanist they know of (read: not an academic), Dr. Lucy Corkin, Class of Programme at Rand Merchant Bank, to come on the show and give some career advice. You may know Dr. Corkin from her many publications, most notably Uncovering African Agency: Angola's Management of China's Credit Lines. If you are an underemployed Sino-Africanist, you owe it to yourself to listen to this episode!
Closing out the month, we have Hangwei Li, a researcher and media trainer from Mediane, Council of Europe (and also contributor to podcast sponsor The Africa Daily) give us her thoughts on the month's topic and what we could do to improve the podcast. Listen as an Asian woman critiques the show!
ALERT: This is a Mandarin-language episode! We are in the middle of getting it transcribed and translated, but for the moment rest assured that it is amazing! We have had a number of wonderful guests already, but we wanted to bring more voices from China to the discussion and talk with them in Mandarin. Hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu had Hangwei Li, a researcher and media trainer from Mediane, Council of Europe (and also contributor to podcast sponsor The Africa Daily) interview two amazing guests. One is Ms. Yolanda Xiaoqing Yue, a tech entrepreneur and graduate of the Cambridge Judge Business School who used to work for Huawei in South Africa. Next is Ms. Yuan Wang, a Harvard graduate who is currently working for the Sino Africa Centre of Excellence Foundation in Kenya. We will have a translation up soon, but tell your Chinese friends to listen!
Continuing the celebration of International Women's Day, hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu explore what it means to be an Asian women in an African country. This week, we have one guest share her experience as a Chinese development worker for a French non-governmental organization: Ms. Lin Yiran, program manager of social water management currently based in the Democratic Republic of the Congo at Solidarités International. Please listen!
P.S. The recording quality was not quite as strong as we would have liked, we are sorry to say.
In a bizarre celebration of International Women's Day, hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu explore what it means to be an Asian women in an African country. This week, we had three guests share their experiences as Asian women scholars who do on-the-ground research in Africa: Prof. Yoon Jung Park, convener/coordinator of the (world-famous) Chinese in Africa/Africans in China (CA/AC) Research Network, who is currently an adjunct professor at Georgetown University with affiliations as Senior Research Associate of the Sociology Department at Rhodes University; Solange Guo Chatelard, a PhD candidate at the Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Paris and an associate at the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology in Halle/Saale, Germany, whose work studying Chinese communities in Zambia got her a job a production assistant in the film "When China Met Africa"; and Vivian Lu, a PhD student at Stanford University's Department of Anthropology looking at economic networks linking African merchants to production and trade sites of everyday goods in Asia and Africa. Lucky us!
In a bizarre celebration of International Women's Day, hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu explore what it means to be an Asian women in an African country. This week, we had three guests to share their experiences in the NGO and entrepreneurial world: Jules Shen, an employee of Dalberg in Senegal; Evanna Hu of g.Maarifa in Nairobi; and Eugenia Lee advises nonprofits and startups on how to use ethnographic methods for better engagement of communities. If you are interested in topics of race, gender, and perception, this month's series should make you VERY happy!
China's stadium diplomacy is a topic that we do not really touch on this podcast but that all changed after hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu read Mr. Hikabwa Decius Chipande's blog post "China’s Stadium Diplomacy: A Zambian Perspective" which was on Football is Coming Home. The hosts inveted Chipande on the pod to discuss his piece, and he graciously agreed. He is studying the social and cultural history of football in Zambia in the 20th century and he is a recipient of the FIFA Havelange Research Scholarship for his doctoral dissertation on the social and political history of football in Zambia, 1950-1993. What an expert!
Hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu enter the exciting filed of sociolinguistics! They ask Ms. Anthonia Akhidenor, a sociolinguist herself with interests in China and other foreign countries’ labor relations with Africa, to talk about her recent article "Code-switching in the conversations of the Chinese trading community in Africa: the case of Botswana," published last December in the journal English Today.
PS Sorry for the distortion on the recording!
After last week's episode, hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu brought on another person Winslow met at the African Studies Association Annual Meeting last year: Mr. Derek Sheridan, An anthropology PhD student at Brown University, Derek is studying Chinese migration in east Africa. He is interested in broader questions of transnationalism, migration, identity, and more! He also speaks Mandarin after putting in a few years in Taiwan. Derek came on the pod to discuss anthropology, epistemology, theory, and if there is such a thing as "China-Africa Studies." Prepare for some deep thoughts!
Hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu wanted to introduce their listeners to Liu Shaonan, an African history PhD student at Michigan State University who is studying the history of Ghana's Chinese diaspora. Originally from China himself, Shaonan talks about Africa-China history, current China-Ghana relations, the importance of Twi, and more. If any of our Chinese listeners are interested in African studies, this episode is a must-listen!
You wanted South Sudanese voices? We have South Sudanese voi - we have A South Sudanese voice on hand to share her fascinating insights on South Sudan's peace process, China/South Sudan relations, and the future of the young country. Hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu had a live discussion with Ms. Natalina Malwal, a representative of the South Sudanese community in the U.S.
While Dr. Daniel Large gave an excellent overview of Chinese/South Sudanese history, there was not as much of a discussion on South Sudan's relations with neighboring countries (China is not a neighbor, after all). Hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu asked Ms. Lesley Anne Warner, an Africa security specialist, to talk a little more about the particulars of South Sudanese politics and how they relate to its foreign policy, to which she graciously agreed. Despite their best efforts, there were still technical difficulties in the recording, however: a slight scratching sound every time Winslow speaks. But you do not listen to this podcast for what Winslow has to say, correct?
Here are some outtakes from episode 17: Ruined Holiday - 00:11 Policy Recommendations - 01:01 When - 04:48 Close to the Bone - 07:10 Banter - 14:37
Hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu continue their discussion of China/South Sudan relations, this time examining the history between both countries. And who better to ask than Dr. Daniel Large, Assistant Professor at Central European University and the Director of the Rift Valley Institute of the Sudan Open Archive. He recently completed his PhD at the University of London's School of Oriental and African Studies. His thesis, "Fantastic Invasions: intervention and the politics of the international in Sudan," looks at the international community's relations with Sudan and how it reacted to Chinese engagement with the country. He has also published a number of books and articles, notably a co-edited volume with Chris Alden and Ricardo Soares de Oliveira: "China Returns to Africa: A Continent and a Rising Power Embrace, published by Hurst Publishers and Columbia University Press. He also wears extremely stylish glasses, but we fear you will not be able to see them!
PS There are a few technical glitches with the recording, for which we apologize! Also, our Chinese and South Sudanese guests could not participate in this podcast :(
Hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu start off 2014 by spending a month discussing Chinese relations with South Sudan and some of the current problems facing the world's youngest country. Joining them is Thomas Wheeler, an expert on Chinese security issues in Africa, especially related to involvement in South Sudan. His articles have been published in Global Review, The Diplomat, and more. The thoroughness with which he answers Winslow's questions is worth a listen alone.
Happy New Year!
In the last show, Cowries and Rice did not manage to have any African perspective on being Black in China versus being African in China. Hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu thankfully got in touch with Mr. Kumbukilani Phiri, a Zambian who speaks fluent Mandarin after studying, working, and living in China and who is currently employed at the Sunshine Kaidi New Energy Group. He generously offered his thoughts on the matter. Sadly, there were a few technical glitches so they only managed to have a WeChat conversation, which was recorded after the fact. It is still a great episode!
Hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu once again delve into discussions about race in China, and to help guide them through the discussion is Mr. Marketus Presswood, who is pursuing his PhD in Modern Chinese History and has a broad interest in the experience of African-Americans and the African Diaspora as whole in China. Back in July, he wrote a fantastic article for Tea Leaf Nation/The Atlantic called "A Minority in the Middle Kingdom: My Experience Being Black in China," which, well, talked about being black in China. He also has extensive experience in international education, including bringing African-American students to study abroad in China, where he lived for eight years. We asked him to share his thoughts on being Black in China versus being African in China.
PS We actually did line up an African guest but sadly things did not work out! We are not trying to ignore African voices on the subject!
Hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu ask how Nelson Mandela's recent death is being interpreted in China. Returning to the show is Mr. Bob Wekesa, an expert on African-Chinese media relations who has written a number of articles on the subject. Wekesa is a PhD candidate at Communication University of China and research associate at the University of the Witwatersrand.
Hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu (back from vacation) asked Vivian Lu, PhD student at Stanford University's Department of Anthropology, for her thoughts on the Sino-Africa field, whether such a field exists, the importance of fieldwork, and, most importantly, to share some wacky stories from the field.
The Cowries and Rice team of Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu were painfully aware that they were discussing the DRC while having no Congolese voices. They were put in touch with Gaius Vagheni Kowene, a Congolese freelance journalist, filmmaker, and blogger. He volunteers in media and communication department at the cultural center Yolé!Africa, in Goma, DR Congo. He is also Goma correspondent of Radio Netherlands Worldwide and works with many local and international news agencies. He shared some of his perspectives on the subject in this (very difficult to produce) podcast.
PS Hongxiang Huang was the cohost and he asked some great questions but due to a glitch his contribution could not be uploaded :[
So what do Chinese people think about China-Democratic Republic of Congo relations? We are not totally sure, so host Winslow Robertson (Dr. Nkemjika Kalu made a prior commitment) asks Africa-China journalist extraordinaire Hongxiang Huang for his thoughts. Though neither Huang or Winslow are DRC experts, they do try to place Hongxiang's experiences within a DRC framework. Does it actually work? Listen and find out!
Continuing in their mad attempt to talk about one country for a whole month, hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu continue their discussion about the Democratic Republic of the Congo, this time focusing on the famous Sicomines deal between two large Chinese companies and the Congolese government. They have recruited Ms. Johanna Jansson, a PhD candidate at Roskilde University and the most knowledgable researcher about Sicomines, to talk on the show and share her considerable knowledge. Listen as she effortlessly parries Winslow's feeble attempts to get her into a debate! What a scholar! What a pro!
Join your hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu as they bite off more than they could chew and try to talk intelligently about the Democratic Republic of the Congo for an entire month, starting with discussing the idea of the Chinese as foreigner in the Democratic Republic of Congo. This big topic required two guests, and they were lucky to get them: Prof. Laura Seay, Assistant Professor of Government at Colby College and all-around DRC maven; and Jacob Kushner, who just wrote a fantastic book about recent Chinese interaction with the DRC and its peoples.
PS Unsurprisingly, we were hit with some pretty big technical difficulties so we apologize in advance!
Join your hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu as they talk about how Chinese people are grappling with China's growing role in African affairs. Their guest this week is Mr. Hongxiang Huang, a freelance journalist who just started a Wits China Africa Reporting Grant and who knows a ton about Chinese public diplomacy.
PS Still working on the tech issues, please bear with us!
Join your hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu as they talk about what it is like being an African woman in China. Their guest this week is Ms. Marianne Daka, a Zambian business journalist who recently finished up her M.A. in Business Journalism at Tsinghua University.
PS Rated PG-13 for language!
Join your hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu as they look at what the tragic September 21 Westgate attack in Nairobi meant for Chinese-Kenyan relations. Helping them is Mr. Bob Wekesa, a Kenyan PhD candidate (who just defended his proposal) at Communication University of China and visiting researcher at the University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa. An expert on domestic China-Africa media, we asked him to give his thoughts on how the attack was reported in China versus Kenya and what the affect was, if any, on the broader relationship.
PS The podcast gods did not allow a solid internet connection, so please excuse the poor quality of the recording!
Join your hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu as they try and determine some of the major indicators of high-quality China-Africa research. They asked Dr. Yoon Jung Park, the convener/coordinator of the (world-famous) Chinese in Africa/Africans in China (CA/AC) Research Network, to be a guest on the podcast. Dr. Park is currently a freelance researcher. She has affiliations as Senior Research Associate of the Sociology Department at Rhodes University and just finished a Visiting Professorship in the African Studies Department of Howard University. If you ever wanted to figure out how to read an Africa-China article and/or news story like a pro, please listen to this episode!
PS Please excuse the typing sounds!
Join your hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu as they tackle two topics that Winslow is pretty unfamiliar with: Chinese economics and African employment. They asked Merlin Linehan, who has a background working in international development and finance relating to emerging markets, to be a guest on the podcast. He is the head of China in Africa, which provides clients with high quality business intelligence on Chinese companies operating in Africa. If you you ever asked what China's economic downturn means for African employment, please listen to this episode!
This is a recording of a lecture by Dr. Yoon Jung Park, entitled "The Chinese, The Taiwanese, 'Fong Kong,' and Labor in South Africa" that took place on September 12, 2013 at the Ralph J. Bunche International Affairs Center. Dr. Park was introduced by the director of the Center, Dr. Harold Scott. Dr. Park's lecture was followed by a question and answer session.
Introduction - 0:32 Lecture - 5:21 Questions and answers - 1:01:17
Join your hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu as they try and understand the recently released Chinese white paper, China-Africa Economic and Trade Cooperation (2013). If you are listening to this podcast, we are pretty sure you heard about it. Assisting them is Frances Pontemayor, a Chinese development finance specialist with an interest in Africa-China relations who recently received her Masters in Public Policy from Tsinghua University. If you wanted to know what does this document means, why it was written, how accurate the statistics are, and more, please listen to this episode!
Join your hosts Winslow Robertson and Dr. Nkemjika Kalu as they engage in pseudo-intellectual navel-gazing: whether China is a neocolonial power or not. However, not content to simply discuss this issue as is, they are adding an extra layer of texture by using former Ghanaian President/famous Pan-Africanist Kwame Nkrumah’s definition of the term "neo-colonialism" from his 1965 book Neo-Colonialism, the Last Stage of imperialism.
The triumphant debut of the Cowries and Rice Podcast, the second-best China-Africa podcast you ever heard! Join host Winslow Robertson and others as they discuss all aspects of the China-Africa relationship. Join host Winslow Robertson with (possibly permanent) co-hosts Dr. Nkemjika Kalu, Elle Wang, and Andy Liu as they discuss perceptions of China-Africa relations.