With the Trump administration’s trade agenda focused on reining in China and renegotiating the North American Free Trade agreement, Africa has barely appeared on the radar screen.
That could change this week as President Donald Trump’s top trade negotiator and other senior U.S. officials head to the West African nation of Togo to review a Clinton-era free trade pact with sub-Saharan Africa, in the administration’s first high-level delegation to visit the region.
Looming over the two-day ministerial is China’s growing role in African trade and influence, as Beijing finances massive infrastructure projects in the region, some through its new Asian Infrastructure and Investment Bank.
While U.S. exports to sub-Saharan Africa as a whole have doubled to $21.81 billion from $10.96 billion in 2000, according to U.S. Commerce Department data, they were dwarfed by China’s $102 billion in exports to the region in 2015.
