 | ||
China and Cameroon established bilateral relations on March 26, 1971. Cameroon is an adherent to the One China Policy.
Contents
Political relations
The People's Republic established relations with Cameroon in 1971. In the 2000s, leading politicians paid state visits to and from each country; these included Cameroonian President Paul Biya's visit for a conference in 2006 and Hu Jintao's visit to Cameroon in 2007.
Chinese Foreign Minister, Wang Yi, is scheduled to visit Cameroon on 12 January, 2014.
Economic development
Since the first Forum on China Africa Cooperation in 2000, Beijing has successfully delivered $2.4 billion in development finance to Cameroon. $87 million of that total falls under the OECD-DAC criteria for Official Development Assistance. Major projects executed by the Chinese government in Cameroon include:
Yearly trade topped 854 million US dollars in 2008, before dropping to 813 million US dollars in 2009 due to the global recession.
Criticism
In the 2000s, some in Cameroon considered the economic relationship to be a form of neo-colonialism; this was mainly due to a perception that Chinese traders flooded the Cameroonian market with cheap but extremely fragile manufactured goods, which stymied the development of local industries.