Rekindling the Africa rising narrative

The Dar es Salaam Consensus is one of the blueprints advancing China-Africa cooperation, making it one of the greatest mutual cooperations in the 21st century

The global community today is facing both traditional and nontraditional security threats that endanger its socioeconomic stability and development. Against this backdrop, scholars and policy experts from about 50 countries in Africa and China jointly released the Dar es Salaam Consensus at the 13th Meeting of the China-Africa Think Tanks Forum in Tanzania's port city of Dar es Salaam in March. The Consensus provides a policy dialogue platform for deepening global development cooperation.

Today, both China and Africa have entered a new development stage as indicated by the Consensus. This development paradigm is creating more opportunities for Africa's development. For instance, China has developed more than 100,000 kilometers of roads, 10,000 km of railway, 1,000 bridges, approximately 100 ports, and several energy facilities in Africa. These infrastructure expansions continue to usher in a new era of connectivity and accessibility across the continent, making Africa a fulcrum and frontier of development. Indeed, the Dar es Salaam Consensus has rekindled the Africa rising narrative.

Further, the Dar es Salaam Consensus will strengthen Africa's economic integration, providing more room for growth in China-Africa cooperation. The two civilizations are focused on boosting quality development and further aligning the goals of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, the Belt and Road Initiative, the Global Development Initiative, the Global Security Initiative and the Global Civilization Initiative with those of the African Union Agenda 2063, the United Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, and the development strategies of individual African countries such as Kenya's Vision 2030.This will strengthen high-quality sustainable development pledges, ensuring that no country or society is left behind. This exemplifies the true meaning of building a community with a shared future for mankind.

In retrospect, the immense success of China's path to modernization inspired the Dar es Salaam Consensus that emboldened Africa's search for its own independent path to modernization. For Africa, modernizing its infrastructure, boosting economic growth, development and foreign investment and eradicating poverty catalyze its quest for an African renaissance story.

The Dar es Salaam Consensus also breaks the myth that modernization equals Westernization. For China, the path to modernization for both civilizations is anchored on the principles of mutual respect, solidarity, win-win cooperation, openness and common prosperity. As a breath of fresh air, the Dar es Salaam Consensus is advocating for reform of the international financial system to bridge the development gap, and ensure countries in the Global South have the same opportunities as those in the Global North.

Knowing that the promotion of dialogue and consensus in a multipolar world is fundamental to ensuring the countries in the Global South experience true modernization, delegates present made several consensuses. First is the adoption of more practical and effective measures to promote knowledge sharing. Second, give priority to development and explore independent, people-centered paths of mutual respect and mutual learning. Third, promote the building of an equal and orderly multipolar world to facilitate common development. Fourth, advance a universally beneficial and inclusive economic globalization to share the dividends of development. Fifth, promote reform of the international financial system to bridge the development gap. Sixth, ensure that China and Africa align with international initiatives and national plans to strengthen high-quality sustainable development bonds. Seventh, activate domestic development through effective markets and proactive governments. Last, the Dar es Salaam Consensus calls on the global community to consider both traditional and nontraditional security threats to create a secure development environment.

Additionally, the Consensus has shown that both Chinese modernization and the African renaissance are still works in progress. None place their achievements as being superior to the other. The act of humility between China and Africa is deeply rooted in ancient times and hardened in the furnace of mutual struggles against imperialism and their shared aspirations for freedom and development.

Thus, as Africa continues to search for an independent path to modernity, recovery, development and renewal, rooted in the African cultures and philosophy, the Dar es Salaam Consensus will serve as one of the blueprints advancing China-Africa cooperation, making the destiny of the two ancient civilizations inextricably interlinked, and one of the greatest stories of cooperation in the 21st century.

The author is executive director of the China-Africa Center at the Africa Policy Institute. The author contributed this article to China Watch, a think tank powered by China Daily.

Contact the editor at editor@chinawatch.cn.