Full coverage: G20 Hangzhou Summit

Several African countries have also been invited to attend this year's G20 summit. The Southern African Research and Documentation Centre in Zimbabwe says the timing is right for the continent to participate. African countries and other emerging economies are playing a bigger role in global matters.

"Africa you know is the emerging giant, it’s a very wealthy continent, it got a lot of human capital, we need various things to develop, investment, infrastructure, technology, and China has been working on that, China has done quite a lot in terms of supporting the continent to build infrastructure since the beginning of the formal FOCAC, formal China-Africa cooperation relation since 2000 through its relations with the African Union, investment is increasing in different countries. I think there’s quite a big potential, the only African member of the BRICS Group is South Africa, the only African member of G20 is South Africa, and I think China would like to just make sure that other African countries in other perspectives are included, it’s quite appropriate to include the chair of the African Union, quite appropriate to include the current chair of NEPAD, and of course Egypt is a power in the north, so all of those countries have a role in the global economy and in the emerging economy of Africa. I think it make sense. I think it was China’s choice that have more African countries there, but these are representatives, it’s good," said founding director of Sardc Zimbabwe Phyllis Johnson.