SHANGHAI, China: Beijing will encourage Chinese companies, especially small and medium-size firms, to invest in Africa, the head of the country's central bank said Tuesday.
People's Bank of China Governor Zhou Xiaochuan's comments came at the African Development Bank's annual meeting in China's commercial hub of Shanghai, underscoring growing economic and political ties between China and the resource-rich continent.
An estimated 700-800 Chinese companies are active in Africa, sending two-way trade soaring to US$55.5 billion last year, four times its 2000 level, according to the bank. Beijing says it wants to that figure to rise to US$100 billion by 2020.
In his address to a forum on Sino-Africa financial cooperation, Zhou also said China would help African countries reduce their debt.
China has already forgiven more than US$1 billion in debt to it held by African countries, and is estimated to have provided billions of dollars (euros) in aid to the continent.
Meanwhile, China's total investment in Africa, reported by the government at US$11.7 billion, is growing quickly as Chinese companies buy up stakes in oil and gas fields, among other assets.
Aid, often low- or zero-interest loans repayable on flexible schedules, has been a pillar of Chinese relations with the continent, funding infrastructure such as railways, although some funds have also been wasted on vanity projects and white elephants.
African officials present at the Shanghai meeting said they welcome China's involvement, but their calls for aid and investment to foster good governance and anti-corruption efforts at times appeared to clash with China's insistence that it attaches no political conditions to its assistance.
China is one of 24 non-African shareholders in the African Development Bank, along with the United States, Japan, France, India and Britain.
Zhou sits on the bank's board of governors.
Gao Jian, the vice governor of state-run China Development Bank, said Sunday the bank plans to set up a fund with a total investment of US$5 billion (€3.69 billion) to help finance the development of African countries and support Chinese enterprises in Africa.