China’s vast construction of infrastructure around the world involves not only promises of transnational cooperation, connectivity, and national development, but also local dispossession. Indeed, construction requires large tracts of land, which often leads to the displacement of local people. In Laos, investments since the early-2000s have entailed land loss and questionable safeguard practices. Despite pressure […]
In a new working paper, Global China Initiative Fellow Yunnan Chen examines the railway sector in Ethiopia and discusses the implications of local decision-making on technology, skills transfer, and Chinese contractors. Following the international surge of Chinese capital and companies in the last decade and the rise of the Belt and Road Initiative, many African […]
By Rebecca Ray and Blake Alexander Simmons The China’s Overseas Development Finance Database is a geospatial dataset for analysis of China’s sovereign lending commitments and their proximity to Critical Habitats, National Protected Areas and Indigenous Peoples’ Lands. The database tracks lending commitments by China’s two major policy banks, the China Development Bank (CDB) and the […]
In 2019, trade between China and Latin American and the Caribbean (LAC) hit record figures, though the relationship between exports and imports has largely held steady from 2018. Infrastructure continued to form the backbone of the relationship, providing the majority of both development finance and investment. These are among findings of the China-Latin America Economic […]
In 2019, overseas energy financing by China’s two policy banks with global operations, the China Development Bank (CDB) and the Export-Import Bank of China (CHEXIM), was at its lowest level since 2008. In a new policy brief, Xinyue Ma, Kevin P. Gallagher and Yanan Guo examine China’s global energy finance in 2019, using the China’s […]
In the fall of 2013, Chinese leader Xi Jinping announced the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) as a means to mobilize resources, strengthen connectivity links, leverage potential growth drivers and connect markets with a view to integrating more countries and regions into economic globalization and achieving shared prosperity through mutually beneficial cooperation. Aligning the BRI […]
The emergence of China as a new economic partner for Amazon basin countries has brought benefits to South America and China alike. In less than two decades, China has become an important market for the region’s products and an essential source of finance and investment. The burgeoning relationship has granted China access to new products […]
Energy is the lifeblood of the global economy, critical to all sectors of the economy including agriculture, transportation, waste collection, information technology and communications sources. In 2011, energy expenditures amounted to approximately 10 percent of the world gross domestic product (GDP), in which North America accounts for 20 percent, Europe for 25 percent and Japan […]
Rarely has a non-US policy program generated as much controversy as the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). Five years later, the BRI is by far the most watched foreign policy initiative that China has projected on the world stage, yet its roots and effects have been and will be continuously shaped by China’s internal political […]
Over the past 15 years, China has become one of the largest investors in the world, with Chinese companies, commercial banks and policy banks making major inroads in every region of the globe. China also launched the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) in 2013 with the goal of catalyzing trillions of dollars of investments into […]