88
AFRICA
’
S
SILK ROAD:
CHINA AND INDIA
’
S
NEW ECONOMIC FRONTIERThe third aspect is the diversity among African countries and potential benefits from regional integration. Just as African-Asian trade relations encompass various dynamics due to rich variability among Asian countries—from high-income Japan to low-income but dynamically developing economies such as Vietnam—a rich variability is also found among African nations. Particularly, South Africa has evolved as a regional hub of industrial and commercial development in Sub-Saharan Africa and even beyond. The technological complementarities between South Africa and China or India exist at a higher level than is the case for other African countries. This provides scope for more intraindustry
trade between SouthAfrica and China and India. Through regional integration, the emerging intrasectoral complementarities between such industrial leaders in Africa and China and India could lead to wider benefits at the subregional markets through further forward and backward linkages see chapter Increasing exports to China and India presents both opportunities and challenges to Africa. Africa could benefit from rapidly growing Asian markets in those countries to achieve broadly
based economic development, or it could become merely a resource base for Asia’s growing economies, benefiting little to its domestic economic development. The agenda for African countries to allow them to benefit from such growth of trade with China and India is really linked to two key questions how to create an enabling environment for engaging more extensively
in value-added production, in natural resources as well as other sectors and how to effectively participate in global supply chains. These are the focus of chapter 6.
Share with your friends: 
