As the U.S. continues to expand its list of tariffs on Chinese goods, the latest data from China's General Administration of Customs in 2024 shows a 104% year-on-year surge in trade volume of new energy vehicles between China and Africa. From Ethiopian coffee beans to South African lithium ore, an industrial migration spanning the Indian Ocean is rewriting global economic rules.

Ⅰ.Africa's Rise as a Breadbasket: Decoding China's Agricultural Strategy to  to "De-Americanize"

72 hours after the Trump Administration announced a tariff increase on $370 billion worth of Chinese goods, COFCO signed an agreement to import 1 million tons of soybeans from Mozambique. This is not an isolated incident — China’s agricultural imports from Africa exceeded $62 billion in 2023, with an increase of 287% from the early stages of the trade war in 2018. On Zambia's vast farmlands, the BeiDou Navigation Satellite System is guiding local farmers to achieve a leap in maize yield from 1.8 to 6.3 tons per hectare.

“The arable land area in Africa is three times that of China, yet its utilization rate remains below 30%” Experts from the Chinese Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs pointed out. Through the "agricultural special zone" model, China has established modern agricultural demonstration parks in 24 African countries, with hybrid rice technology quadrupling Madagascar's rice yield per unit of area. While U.S. soybean exporters lament their China market share drop from 37% to 17%, the China-Africa agricultural trade deficit is narrowing by 19% annually.

Ⅱ.Formation of the Lithium Battery Corridor: The "Transoceanic Breakthrough" of New Energy Vehicles

In Kolwezi, Democratic Republic of the Congo, the battle for control of the world’s largest cobalt mine has reached a fever pitch. In Q1 2024, Chinese enterprises invested $8.4 billion in African lithium mines, with a 156% increase year-on-year. This "lithium battery corridor" stretching from Congo to Namibia underpins BYD’s construction of Africa’s first EV Gigafactory in Cape Town.

Customs data shows China’s NEV exports to Africa reached 482,000 vehicles in 2023, with GAC Aion capturing over 31% market share in Egypt. In stark contrast, after the U.S. raised tariffs on Chinese EVs from 25% to 100%, Tesla’s Shanghai Gigafactory shifted all Model 3 facelift production capacity to its Morocco base.

Ⅲ.Digital Silk Road: Capacity Relocation behind 5G Base Station

When Washington banned Huawei’s 5G equipment, this tech behemoth was constructing Africa's largest data center in Ethiopia. As at April 2024, Chinese enterprises have cumulatively built 150,000 5G base stations in Africa, covering a population of over 370 million. TECNO dominate with a market share of 47% over Samsung through localized operating systems, with its Shenzhen R&D center processing 8 million pieces of African user feedback daily.

"Every dollar invested in the infrastructure of Africa can drive $2.3 in manufacturing export." A report by the Academy of the Ministry of Commerce reveals. Along the Mombasa-Nairobi Railway, the annual production capacity of Sany Heavy Industry and XCMG’s African industrial parks has exceeded 800,000 units of equipment, with these "Made in China" machinery now being exported to Latin American market.

Ⅳ.Currency Breakthrough: The "Sahara Line of Defense" in CNY Settlement

In March 2024, the Central Bank of Egypt announced an increase in its CNY reserve ratio to 18%. It is the 9th African country to include Renminbi in its foreign exchange reserves, following Nigeria and South Africa. The cross-border CNY settlement volume between China and Africa surged from 120 billion in 2018 to 1.2 trillion in 2023, with Guangzhou’s "Africa Coffee CNY Pricing Center" achieving a daily turnover over cny 3 billion.

In stark contrast, U.S. agricultural exporters are caught in double binds: soybean exports to China plummeted by 63%, while trading volume of CNY-denominated contracts on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange surged by 420%. Federal Reserve data show that over the past five years, the number of bank failures in the U.S. agricultural belt increased by 17 and recorded high since 1932.

Ⅴ.Historical Cycle: From the Hoover Tariff to the Trump Trap

In 1930, the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act caused a 66% plunge in U.S. imports, and now a similar scenario is unfolding once again. Simulations by the Peterson Institute for International Economics show that if the Section 301 tariffs on China are fully escalated, the U.S. would permanently lose 245,000 jobs, while every 10% increase in China-Africa trade could offset 0.8% of export losses to the U.S.

At Ghana's Tema Port, 12 China-Europe freight trains return weekly laden with electronics. This "circuitous trade" transiting through Africa makes it difficult for U.S. customs to trace the origin. As commented by The Economist: "While the U.S. is building tariff walls, China is constructing overpasses to the future."