By Xu Huan, associate chief editor and researcher of Foreign Theoretical Trends
At the invitation of Chinese President Xi Jinping, Nigerian President Muhammad Buhari paid a state visit to China on April 11-15.
It's Buhari's first visit to China since becoming president, and his first official visit to an Asian country. He is the first African leader to visit China after the FOCAC Summit in Johannesburg.
Nigeria is Africa's largest economy and a member of the MINTs (economic organization - Mexico, Indonesia, Nigeria, and Turkey). The Nigerian economy, population, and oil exports are ranked at the top in Africa.
During the last decade, Nigeria has maintained an average annual economic growth rate of 6.8%. It is one of fastest growing countries in the world, but faces multiple challenges.
In 2015, the Nigerian economic growth rate had dropped to 3.3%. Its nearly 600 billion dollars domestic production ranks the top in Africa, the 21st around the world, 1.7 times as large as South Africa, which comes in second place in Africa.
The country has accounted for more than 30% of African economic growth. The Nigerian economy in 2016 is expected to have a 4.6% growth rate with huge development potential.
Nigeria is China's most important economic partner in Africa, which has been China's largest overseas project contracting markets in Africa, the second largest export market and third largest trading partner and a main investment destination.
In 2014, the Sino-Nigerian trade volume reached 18.1 billion US dollars, nearly 9 times more than in 2004. In 2015, total trade volume has declined, but its proportion of China-Africa trade volume had risen to 8.4%.
By the end of 2015, China's investment in Nigerian non-financial fields has accumulated over 2.5 billion US dollars. Satellite launchings, railway construction and other large projects have been set off. Lekki Peninsula, Ogun and other FTA constructions are being promoted, which depicts rapid development of China-Nigerian pragmatic cooperation.
Nigeria - rich in natural resources, with a large population and broad development prospects - holds huge market potential, but poor in infrastructure construction. It has urgent demand to strengthen infrastructure projects including railways, highways, and hydropower stations.
As the world's second largest economy, China has advantages in finance, technology, and experience that are needed for Nigeria.
Both sides have highly-complementary economies in energy, infrastructure, agriculture, solid minerals, aviation, information and communication technology. President Bukhari mentioned how bilateral economic cooperation offers plenty of opportunities for both sides.
At the China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) summit held in Johannesburg last December, President Xi had expounded on Beijing's new ideas, concepts, policies, and initiatives for China-Africa relations. He charted a new blueprint of "1+5+10" China-Africa cooperation development.
Beijing has offered to provide 60 billion US dollars funds to support smooth implementation of ten cooperation programs, serving as a platform to deepen China-Nigerian pragmatic cooperation in various fields.
2016 marks the 45th anniversary of the establishment of Sino-Nigerian diplomatic relations and the first year for implementing the blueprint of the China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) summit in Johannesburg.
President Bukhari's visit demonstrates that Chinese leaders can work together to chart a development plan that highlights mutually beneficial cooperation in various areas to inject new momentum to China-Nigerian strategic partnership development, and will promote cooperation between the largest economies in Asia and Africa to a new level.
( The opinions expressed here do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Panview or CCTV.com. )
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