Advertisement
Opinion | How Egypt became an essential destination for Chinese investment
- One highly visible example of China’s pursuit of increased engagement with countries in the Global South is its rising economic and diplomatic activity in Egypt, where official visits and investment by Chinese firms in a variety of sectors are building on long-standing relations
Reading Time:3 minutes
Why you can trust SCMP
1
China’s policy of strengthening relations with countries in the Global South has accelerated in recent years, and this can be seen in its development of wide-ranging ties with Egypt. Under the umbrella of a comprehensive strategic partnership, China has invested heavily in Egypt, especially in the agriculture, technology, steel, construction, textile and tourism industries.
Advertisement
On May 13, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi inaugurated the first phase of a large-scale project west of Cairo, built with the help of China’s Famsun Group and aimed at achieving food security and exporting agricultural products. Egypt is expected to achieve significant savings on the project, which includes the establishment of an industrial zone for food manufacturing, by paying for its costs in Egyptian pounds rather than US dollars.
Through presidential diplomacy and meetings between Chinese and Egyptian officials, ties between Egypt and China are developing in the economic, political, cultural and security fields. According to a statement last month by China’s ambassador to Egypt Liao Liqiang, “The development of bilateral relations has entered the fast lane and is now at its best.”
Earlier this week, Huawei Technologies launched its Arabic large language model (LLM) at the Huawei Cloud Summit in Cairo. According to Huawei, the Arabic LLM’s automatic speech recognition capability has an accuracy rate of 96 per cent and the capacity to cover more than 20 countries in which Arabic is spoken.
Likewise, as part of efforts to promote mutual cultural understanding, the Shanghai Museum has announced a forthcoming exhibition titled: “On Top of the Pyramid: The Civilisation of Ancient Egypt”, possibly the largest showcase of ancient Egyptian civilisation in Asia.
02:02
China is building a new Egyptian capital in the desert under its Belt and Road Initiative
China is building a new Egyptian capital in the desert under its Belt and Road Initiative
Sitting at the northeastern tip of Africa, Egypt holds a strategic location that links Africa, the Middle East, Asia and Europe. That is why it was the first country on Foreign Minister Wang Yi’s tour of African countries in January. Wang met Sisi and other top Egyptian officials in Cairo to elevate bilateral relations and accelerate momentum for greater political and economic cooperation between the two countries.
Advertisement
Advertisement