India-Africa relations

Between the 26th and 30th of October, 2015, African leaders gathered in India for the India-Africa Forum to discuss issues of mutual concern between India and Africa. The first forum took place in Delhi in 2008 and there was another follow-up, albeit on a smaller scale, in Addis-Ababa in 2011.

For India, having come late to the table in terms of trade with Africa, the forum was perhaps an attempt to play a bit of a catch-up to China. But India is not about to compete with China’s cheque book diplomacy and it is not pretending to.

For more than 15 years now, China has been wooing Africa and is now Africa’s largest trading partner with a rough annual trade of $200 billion. It is also the biggest investor in Africa committing billions of dollars into ports, roads, dams, rail tracks and other infrastructure projects while sourcing raw materials, minerals, and especially oil from Africa.

India, whose economy is just taking off again, does not have China’s deep pockets but also badly needs oil, minerals and raw materials that Africa has to offer but also wants to substantially contribute to Africa’s growth and development, especially in areas of skills development and capacity building.

Over the years, India has concentrated on institution building, on education, technology, telemedicine and skills development and has now become a global exporter of ICT skills and a globally recognised destination for medical tourism. No doubt, these are areas of great interests to Africa.

Another area of interest for India and Africa is agriculture. Prior to the forum, senior African and Indian officials met to work out a development charter on what India and Africa can do together on agriculture, which was expected to be finalised and made public at the end of the summit.

Considering that both Africa and India have the same circumstances and experiences and virtually the same needs, there is room for sharing of experiences. While India learns from (East) Africa’s successful experiment with mobile banking and adapt it to its own situation, Africans could learn from India’s successful pharmaceutical industry, which, though it has been variously opposed by big multinational companies, has saved millions of lives in Africa, drastically brought down the prices of drugs and especially the cost of treating AIDS. Today, Indian pharmaceutical products provide about 80 percent of medicines in poorer African nations.

Crucially, we must mention the hitherto thriving relationship and collaboration between India and Africa. The Pan-African e-Network, a brainchild of former India president, Abdul Kalam, is doing great work connecting universities and hospitals in 48 African countries to counterparts in Indian cities for professional training and advice. The network also built a fibre optic network that provides satellite connectivity to the centres. Similarly, India has awarded over 25,000 scholarships to African students to help in capacity building and skills training for the continent’s workforce. This is impressive.

A key distinction between the Indian and Chinese ventures in Africa is that India, unlike China, is not just interested in raw materials, minerals and oils from Africa and flooding Africa with cheap goods. It is rather more interested in human resource development – a key need area for Africa – and helping to replicate successful Indian experiences in Africa and vice versa. One of these experiences, which will be very critical to Nigeria, is how India has successfully leveraged its huge population to create industries that provide employment and service the home market while producing goods and services at globally competitive prices, which in turn gave it the ability to lift hundreds of millions of its people out of poverty.

Besides, both Africa and India have a common stake in seeking for the reform of the United Nations and both seek to have representation on the permanent membership of the Security Council. India is desirous of working with Africa to see this happen. However, since the African Union is yet to take a common stand on the issue, it is difficult to see what could come out of this.

All said, it must be said that in dealing with Africa as a collective rather than a diverse continent with 54 different countries, India has toed the lines of the United States, most European countries and China, which smacks of a superior attitude and mentality that is not ideal for good bilateral and trade relations. African countries, led by Nigeria and South-Africa, must therefore begin to pull their weights and emphasise the need for bilateral and trade relations on country to country basis and not one in which the outside world treats Africa as a collective.