Cowries and Rice

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!