Pacific Money | Economy | East Asia

China’s Free-Trade Offer to Africa Won’t Solve the Trade Imbalance

Beijing has opened its enormous market to African exports. Whether that helps the continent move up global value chains is another question.

In Abuja on August 14, 2026, nearly 500 government officials, diplomats, scholars, and business representatives gathered for a seminar on China’s new zero-tariff policy and what it means for African economic transformation. Nigeria’s minister of state for agriculture, Aliyu Sabi Abdullahi, used the occasion to strike a cautious note. “Zero tariffs alone do not guarantee success,” he told the room. “The question before us, therefore, is not, can Nigeria export more? The question should be, can Nigeria export better?”

Since May 1, China has extended zero-tariff treatment across 100 percent of tariff lines to the 53 African countries with which it holds diplomatic relations. That gives nearly all of Africa (with the lone exception of Eswatini) duty-free access to one of the world’s largest consumer markets. The early results look encouraging: Chinese imports from Africa reached $28.7 billion in May and June, up 23.5 percent from a year earlier. During the seminar in Abuja, China’s ambassador to Nigeria reported that Chinese imports from Nigeria specifically had already grown more than 40 percent year-on-year in both May and June.

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