In 2010, Kenyan and Chinese archaeologists digging on the Indian Ocean coast found a haul of brass coins that have rewritten Africa’s trade history. Minted in the early 15th Century, the coins show that Chinese missions were reaching the African continent 100 years before Europeans arrived.</p> In the 1950s, newly-independent economies across Asia and Africa began to revive this ancient shipping route, but progress was slow. Trade between China and Africa only reached the one-billion US dollar mark in the 1980s, with India-Africa trade following in 1991.</p> This century, however, Asia-Africa trade has hit the fast lane. Trade between China and Africa has ballooned nearly seventeen-fold to US$135 billion, with trade between Africa and India surging six-fold to US$55 billion.</p> Asia has become Africa’s third largest trading partner after the EU and the US. This means more markets for African exports and access for Africans to a wider variety of consumer goods - often cheaper and better adapted to local conditions.</p> Meanwhile, imports of more affordable industrial goods – from 3G phone masts to efficient machine tools – have accelerated Africa’s own growth and development. Global Asian companies spanning agriculture, telecommunications and infrastructure, such as Samsung and China Communications Construction Corp have made Africa-based enterprises a focal point for their foreign investments.</p> Africa has also begun, slowly, to trade with itself. Companies like the Nigerian conglomerate Dangote Group are leading the way, expanding across the continent, whilst MTN’s telecoms presence across the continent continues to grow – where trade and connectivity are inextricably linked.</p> Trade between Africa countries has doubled since 1990, in part jump-started by the formation of three regional trading blocs – the Southern African Development Community, the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa and the East African Community.</p> Yet, intra-regional trade still accounts for just 12 per cent of Africa’s total exports and imports. This despite the fact that Africa has a population of more than 500 million people, most of them young, a combined GDP of US$625 billion, bountiful natural resources and large areas of uncultivated farmland. If the three African trading blocs were to combine, Africa could easily be one of the largest economic unions in the world today.</p> So the opportunities for further growth in Africa’s trade – with itself and with other regions – are huge, but they will only be unlocked if several structural issues can be overcome.</p> Article contributed by Standard Chartered.</p> This article is an excerpt. View the full article</a>.</p>