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Lovemore Chikova in WUHAN, China
Zimbabwe is among a few African countries selected to attend an on-going three-day production capacity and business cooperation forum by China because of progress in the implementation of various projects.

The Forum on Global Production Capacity and Business Cooperation being held in Wuhan city, Hubei province, is expected to end today, with other participating African countries including Ghana, Malawi, Mozambique and Kenya.

Zimbabwe is being represented by Local Government, Public Works and National Housing Minister Saviour Kasukuwere and Ambassador to China Mr Paul Chikawa, who are both expected to make presentations in a session on Africa today.

Answering a question from The Herald at a press conference for the forum yesterday, a Chinese ministry of Foreign Affairs official Mr Tan Jian said there were a number of reasons determining the invitation of countries to the forum.

“As the one of the hosts of the forum, I would want to answer about the criteria for selection of countries to this forum,” he said.

“I believe one of the criteria is that the country should be closely linked to China in terms of production capacity cooperation. It is a regret that we cannot invite all the countries in Africa. We also considered cooperation with Hubei province and the central China area.”

Another official, Ms Yan Puliu said at the same conference that they considered progress in implementation of projects for the selection of the countries.

“I would like to add some more remarks on the criteria we used to invite guests,” she said.

“The first one is that countries with current projects with Hubei province and the second one is the countries that are in preparation to conduct cooperation with Hubei province.”

Zimbabwe is in the process of implementing several deals signed with China in the last two years, which are expected to change the economy for the good when completed.

The projects are in various sectors, including infrastructure, energy and power development, agriculture and mining, where China is investing billions of dollars.

The Asian economic giant is also on the verge of starting the building of a new Parliament building with related services in Mt Hampden.

The Chinese government has assured Zimbabwe that the mega deals will be implemented without delay.

Mr Tan said they expected African countries to improve their conditions to attract more investment from China.

“As for the expectations of the Chinese towards Africa, the African countries have achieved independence and we would love to participate in their development,” he said.

“We would like to emphasise that we look forward to seeing peace and stability in African countries. In general, the peace is quite stabilised, but in some African countries, however, they are still facing conflicts, for example not along ago a Chinese peacekeeping force died in Mali.

“Secondly, I would like to say that we look forward to seeing a better environment for the businesses and try to protect that enabling environment for us to invest. In this regard, anticipation plays a major role on predictability.

“Thirdly, I would like to say the infrastructure still need to be improved. China would love to actively participate in infrastructure construction in Africa.”

The forum is being co-hosted by the National Development and Reform Commission, China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Hubei Provincial People’s Government.

Delegates, also drawn from other continents like Europe and Asia, shared opportunities provided by China’s central provinces including Hubei, Jiangsu, Shanxi, Anhui and Hunan.