States always trade across and explore opportunities for relevant information on reforms capable of responding to progressive demands of domestic growth and national development. Presently, the traditional development landscape has expanded to include new actors not only devising new development models but also providing a variegated supply of developmental know-how in support of global prosperity – one of the most visible case studies being China’s South–South-based cooperation with Africa via the Forum on China–Africa Cooperation (FOCAC). In their development cooperation, FOCAC-based initiatives posture to bridge inequality and disparity between both sides often through the transfer of knowledge. Regarding this, the Forum employs knowledge sharing as a combination of capacity development initiatives in the form of training and educational, technical, human capacity-building and human resource development, including technology cooperation. However, citing marginal impact on industrialization processes of African countries, sceptics maintain that FOCAC’s trail in the so-called ‘second continent’ translates as a systematic imposition of a Beijing-centric paradigm of globalization. Notwithstanding, given the promise of cross-cultural cooperation in knowledge production, rather than succumb to monocausal critiques on sub-optimal development assistance, this article evaluates the prospects of Nigeria capitalizing on China’s stock of development know-how more strategically.
Recently, African economies that withstood the global economic crisis out of increased cooperation with China are reeling from the country’s declining demand for primary commodities, as it shifts to a domestic-driven growth model. Consequently, Sino-scepticism has rebounded on the premise that the downturn in major African markets is an aftermath of the indentured capitalism fuelling ‘China in Africa’. However, China and Africa can instrumentalise (inter)dependency in their economic engagement, particularly as they undergo unique economic transformations. These changes reveal more diverse avenues for productive investment and beneficial economic cooperation, and demand that both sides place a great deal on appropriate responses to internal and externalist adjustments of their economies. In light of China’s strategic pivot to innovation, it is useful to recommend the exploration of the digital innovation economy where Africa is fast gaining global recognition. With the promise of cross-cultural cooperation in business and technology, the adoption, building and implementation of strategies placing innovation as an integral part of China–Africa cooperation, will ensure China’s investments support Africa’s diversification from commodities trading more constructively, and in a manner that neatly keys into the former’s multipolar vision for technological governance.
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