China-Africa ties to enter new era(2)

PRAGMATIC COOPERATION

China is the world's largest developing country and Africa is a continent made up of mainly developing countries. The cooperation between the two will not only bring about mutually beneficial and win-win results, but also help promote world economic balance and inclusive growth, Li said.

In 2013, China-Africa trade reached $210 billion, 2,000 times that of 1960. China has been Africa's biggest trading partner for five years running. More than 2,500 Chinese companies are operating in Africa, creating over 100,000 jobs.

Last year, more than 1.4 million Chinese visited Africa, bringing a huge amount of foreign currency to Africans.

According to a report of the International Monetary Fund, China-Africa cooperation has contributed to more than 20 percent of Africa's development.

The so-called "China's neo-colonialism in Africa" is a false accusation inconsistent with Chinese tradition and culture, and does not reflect the reality of friendly, equal-footed and mutually beneficial cooperation between China and Africa, Li said.

Like many African countries, China once suffered foreign invasion and fell under colonial and semi-colonial rule. "Do not do to others what you do not want done to you" is a millennia-old idea important in Chinese civilization, Li told African media.

As China is at a critical stage of comprehensively deepening reform and speeding up the transformation of the economic development model, Africa has also started its new journey of seeking strength through unity and promoting development for renewal. China-Africa cooperation thus has the potential of great strides forward.

China is ready to expand cooperation with Africa in building roads, railways, telecommunications networks, power grids and other infrastructure facilities so as to help the continent realize regional interconnectivity, he said, adding that Beijing also encourages Chinese enterprises to form joint ventures with African counterparts in a bid to improve Africa's regional aviation industry.

China is also willing to use its world-leading technologies in high-speed trains to help improve pan-African communication and development.

In the financial area, Li said China has decided to increase its loans for African countries by 10 billion dollars, which brings the total pledged amount to 30 billion dollars, and to expand the China-Africa development fund by 2 billion dollars to 5 billion dollars.

As to poverty reduction, China will train 2,000 agricultural technicians and management personnel for Africa in the coming five years, and tilt its assistance toward such welfare areas as drinking water and prevention and control of epidemics.