The price of commodities is in many cases at historic lows. We're looking at cobalt, lithium, nickel. These are all in rock bottom prices. Oil is kind of fluctuating. So it's not always intuitive that what's happening in China would have a silver lining for Africa. Give us the headline. Give us the elevator pitch of your article and then we'll dive into it about what is this silver lining that you're reading into the China Africa relationship while the Chinese economy is having some difficulties. Yeah.

So I think first, as you establish, I agree with you that it is a difficult time for Africa and African economies. It was out of this bad situation. This is a bad situation. The IMF just released this paper, something called understanding the evolving landscape of China Africa relations.

And by the way, that was a great paper. That was rock star. We'll put it in the show notes, but that one was a, I don't know the people who did this one, but they did a fantastic job. There is an excellent paper and I think it lays bare

Africa's exposure to any downturn in China and especially for the commodity exporters. But you have to go back to 2022. The UNCTAD released a report that showed like 83% of African countries depend on commodities for most of their revenue. That 45 out of the 54 economies depend on commodity exports for more than 60% of revenue. And because of the size and scale of China's appetite over the last 20 years, most of that has been going to China. So automatically Africa's, the way I put it in the article is that Africa's commodity exporters with their undifferentiated, undiversified export baskets are squarely in the value chain of Chinese corporations. And so any slowdown in China has immediate and negative impacts in Africa. So I want to start off by saying it is a bad situation. But then I step back for a minute to think that it is a bad situation, but it's still civil running here. Other things that African economies can take advantage of because of the circumstances we find ourselves in today. And so this is the page that I made. And the first one is that after China shut down because of the COVID and zero COVID policy, it became clear how China centric global value chains were. So most big manufacturers, most big companies around the world, adapted this China plus one strategy, right? You have China, but then you start doing stuff in Malaysia, Indonesia, of Vietnam. But because of tensions in the South China Sea and American military people always saying that China intends to take Taiwan back between 2027 and 2035 or 2030, then companies began to shift to a China plus 10 strategy. Right. And so I argue that places in Latin America and places in Africa have an opportunity to make a substantive bid to be one of the plus 10. So countries, the consciousness relatively stable economies that have made investment in infrastructure, your cook before Kenya, Zambia, maybe there's an opportunity for them to make a stake, a bid for a stake in global value chains. But I also noted Europe, the United States, Japan, Korea are doing everything they can to move themselves out of Chinese value change for critical minerals. China so dominates that space that it is important for them to take Australian wine or China has now canceled grain exports, imports from the US, right? So you're thinking like, what if China decides to do the same with critical minerals, it's time to move out of Chinese value chains. And then you're seeing them move to Africa at exactly the moment when Zimbabwe and Namibia are saying, we're not exporting raw lithium anymore. And the appreciation has to happen at home.

I'm saying

here's an opportunity now for African economies to make a pitch to be that second value chain that is differentiated from the Chinese world. So the idea then, I guess the elevator pitch was that you can always flip all of these things over because crises also present opportunities. And for African economies facing a difficult time, maybe it's time to look for the opportunities that are possible here. The final thing that I say that these is well and ultimate is that because China has been such a dominant market, most African commodity exporters have not put in the hard work to develop alternative markets. As we admit that on China was booming, everybody was booming and the slowdown in China meant there are no options outside of China. So maybe it's time for African commodity exporters to imagine their own China plus one or China plus two strategy in developing markets elsewhere, whether it's in India, Vietnam, in Latin America, or in parts of central and eastern Europe. But this was the gist of my piece that yes, it is a difficult situation, but is it possible to squeeze these lemons and turn them into a bit of lemonade?

Interesting point here on the China plus one. So Ferdinand Marcos Jr., the president of the Philippines is in Germany this week as Germany is trying to diversify away from China. Also last week, the Australians convened a summit with ASEAN leaders. So this new focus on Southeast Asia is something that other countries are doing. We don't see that focus in Africa right now, looking to the 600, 700 million consumers who are here where I'm at in Southeast Asia presents a huge opportunity for African countries. Let's talk Jiejo very quickly. One of the issues that Jude brings up in his piece is about African governments are not without agency and influencing the new reality. You and I were talking before we went on the air about how Guinea is a great example of how an African country leveraged great power rivalries to get what it wanted. Maybe you can talk about that and then we can talk about this question of how African countries can play the great powers off each other much the same way that Joao Lorenzo seems to be doing in Angola as well.