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P1-D: Trade Networks and African Entrepreneurship in Asia

The project‘s objective is to examine the trade networks between Africa and Asia with a focus on the economic ventures of Africans in Asia, in particular of traders and entrepreneurs from Mali, Cameroon, and Nigeria in the Asian countries of Malaysia, China, Thailand, and Vietnam. It investigates the way in which African and Asian traders cooperate and negotiate as well as the effect of this cooperation and the import and export of products on the Asian and African markets, consumers, and social practices related to them. The focus on the cultural and economic repercussions of trade, as it is perceived from the local actors’ point of view, provides a specifically anthropological perspective on the organization of trade networks, the development of entrepreneurial strategies, and the establishment of African diasporic communities in Asian countries. The comparative analysis of the characteristics of their activities are reflected in the political, economic, and legal frameworks in which African traders operate in the different Asian countries.

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P1-A: Matters for crises: Asian enterprises in the mining sector of Africa

Central Africa is one of the richest areas relating to geological resources on the African continent. Several national mining strategies conclude that mining is one of the key industries for future economic development in the sub-region. Commodities distribution, stakeholders and their interrelationships have been comprehensively studied during the AFRASO sub-project (2013-2017) by manifold case studies from Cameroon and in Central African Republic. It has been shown that government owned and private Asian investors systematically gained more influence in the commodities markets over the last 5-10 years. In the second project phase these empirical findings are being further consolidated by organizing an “Afrasia Stakeholder and Commodities Conference” in 2018 in Yaoundé (Cameroon) that underpins general validity and strengthens ownership of local actors. Finally, an “Afrasian stakeholder’s model” will be set up to transform empirical findings to an abstract, theory based level.

AFRASO field work: stakeholder dialogues in the rapidly growing African mining sector (J. Runge)

 

Further reading:

Nguepjouo, D. & J. Runge (in press, 2017): The Perceptions of Local Stakeholders of the Preponderance of Asians in Artisanal and Small-Scale Mining (ASM) in Cameroon. – A. Graf & A. Hashim (eds.): African-Asian Encounters, New Cooperations and New Dependencies. International Institute for Asian Studies (IIAS), Publications, Amsterdam University, pp. 47-77.

Nguepjouo, D. & J. Runge (2014): Geological resources, Nature of Mining and Interest of Asian Companies to Invest in Cameroon and Central African Republic (CAR). – Zentralblatt für Geologie und Paläontologie, Teil I, Heft 1: pp. 75-93.

Runge, J. & J. Shikwati (2011): Geological Resources and Good Governance in Sub-Saharan Africa. Holistic Approaches to Transparency and Sustainable Development in the Extractive Sector. – Taylor & Francis Publ. UK, pp. 1-292.

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S2-A: Handelsnetzwerke und Migration zwischen Afrika und Asien

Übersicht: 

Handelsnetzwerke und Migration zwischen Asien und Afrika bestehen schon seit langer Zeit, sind aber durch die Öffnung Chinas und das chinesische Engagement in Afrika zunehmend im Fokus der westlichen Öffentlichkeit. Über die konkreten kulturellen und wirtschaftlichen Wechselwirkungen aus lokaler Sicht, ist jedoch bisher nur wenig bekannt. Neben makropolitischen Dynamiken beeinflusst der kulturelle Hintergrund der Beteiligten die Organisation von Handelsnetzwerken und die Entwicklung unternehmerischer Strategien. Das Vorhaben geht den Unterschieden zwischen afrikanischen und asiatischen Netzwerken nach. Wir fragen, welche Netzwerke (von Familien bis zu internationalen Unternehmen), welche Sektoren des Handels übernehmen und wie deren Entscheidungsprozesse von der Interaktion mit Angehörigen der anderen Kultur geprägt werden.
Ein Schwerpunkt unsere Forschung gruppiert sich um die Waren selbst. Obwohl Konsumgüter das Gros der afrikanischen Importe aus Asien ausmachen, werden auch Dienstleistungen wie tertiäre Bildung in dem afrikanisch / asiatischen Handelsgeflecht angeboten. Es stellt sich die Frage, in welchen Regionen sich Händler auf welche Angebote und Dienstleistungen spezialisieren. Auch ist kaum bekannt, welche Waren und Dienstleistungen neben Rohstoffen aus Afrika nach Asien gelangen und wie dieser Handel konkret auf der persönlichen Ebene stattfindet. Den Märkten folgen und folgten Menschen und Ideen. Welche Formen des Handels unterstützen Staaten und welche ideologischen und historischen Themen bestimmen die Politik dieser Länder? Welche Migrationserfahrungen machen Afrikaner/Asiaten im jeweiligen fremden Kontext und wie unterscheiden diese sich von den Erfahrungen, die zum Beispiel in Europa gemacht werden? Wie hat sich der Handel verändert und welche neuen Netzwerke haben sich gebildet? Welche Diskurse haben sich über die Aktivitäten der Asiaten in Afrika entwickelt? Wie bewertet man in Afrika einerseits die als positiv erlebten Entwicklungen im Bereich der Infrastruktur und der Güterversorgung, und andererseits die Präsenz der Fremden, die Konkurrenz für afrikanische Unternehmen darstellen und deren Fremdheit oftmals negativ belegt ist? Spielen diese Bewertungen für die Handelsnetzwerke überhaupt eine Rolle?
Die Feldforschungen werden in Westafrika (Kamerun, Mali) und im südlichen Afrika sowie in Indonesien, Malaysia, Japan und China durchgeführt. Das breite regionale Spektrum lässt einen Vergleich zwischen historisch und kulturell unterschiedlichen Regionen zu. Zusammengeführt wird diese Pluralität durch die enge Zusammenarbeit der beteiligten Wissenschaftler und die aufeinander abgestimmten Fragestellungen. Ute Röschenthaler untersucht in Kooperation mit Antoine Socpa in Douala und Yaounde, kamerunische und asiatische Netzwerke, in Bamako in Kooperation mit Birama Diakon die Netzwerke malischer und chinesischer Händler und gemeinsam mit Shigehiro Sassaki afrikanische Netzwerke in Japan. Mamadou Diawara erforscht malische Migranten in Indonesien und Rückkehrer in Bamako. Malaysische Bildungsunternehmer im südlichen Afrika werden von Sandra Manickam untersucht und Matthias Gruber untersucht die alten und neuen chinesisch/südafrikanischen Handelsnetzwerke in Südafrika und China.

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Involvierte AFRASO Mitglieder: 

AFRASO Publications

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Talks and Lectures

Röschenthaler, Ute & Julia Binter ; Trade, crisis and cultural entrepreneurship in the Niger Delta and the Cross River Region ; Saturday, October 3, 2015 ; Marburg
Diawara, Mamadou ; The Time-Tested Traditionist: Intellectual Trajectory and Mediation from the Early Empires to the Present Day. Landscapes, Sources and Intellectual Projects: Politics, History and the West African Past ; Thursday, November 12, 2015 to Saturday, November 14, 2015 ; Department of African Studies and Anthropology (DASA) and Centre of West African Studies (CWAS), University of Birmingham
Ute Röschenthaler ; The History of Green Tea in Mali and Beyond ; Thursday, May 15, 2014 ; Goethe-Universität Frankfurt
Ute Röschenthaler ; The History of Green Tea in Africa ; Thursday, December 18, 2014 ; Bejing University
Diawara, Mamadou ; The Call of the ‘Bush’: Malian Migrants on their Way to Asia ; Wednesday, March 12, 2014 ; Kuala Lumpur
Diawara, Mamadou ; Seeing like scholars. Whose exile? Making a life in being at home and abroad ; Wednesday, March 25, 2015 ; Kapstadt
Ute Röschenthaler ; Commercial Networks and Cultural Brokers: Cameroonian Traders in China ; Wednesday, March 12, 2014 ; Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Diawara, Mamadou ; China und Afrika, SoSe 2013 ; Goethe University Frankfurt
Röschenthaler, Ute; Haugen, Heide & Michaela Pelican ; Challenges to African entrepreneurship in Malaysia ; Thursday, July 9, 2015 ; Sorbonne, Paris
Ute Röschenthaler ; Brokers as Intermediaries in Commercial Trade Networks ; Sunday, December 14, 2014 ; Jinan University, Guangzhou
Röschenthaler, Ute ; Bewegung von Menschen und Gütern im globalen Kontext ; Wednesday, July 1, 2015 ; Hannover
Diawara, Mamadou ; Asien in Afrika, WiSe 2014/15
Diawara, Mamadou ; Asia as Horizon and Home for West Africans from the 1980s ; Saturday, August 8, 2015 ; Stellenbosch Institute for Advanced Study
Diawara, Mamadou ; (Dis-)connections in Histories of African Studies on the Continent and Beyond, ; Friday, July 10, 2015 ; Sorbonne, Paris

S3-A: Chinesische Kulturpolitik und Konfuzius Institute in Afrika

Übersicht: 

Um zu klären, inwiefern kulturelle Interaktionen in den sino-afrikanischen Beziehungen als „weiche“ Einflussnahme neue Entwicklungskonzepte erzeugen und wie sich China mittels seiner Außenkommunikation in Afrika darstellt, untersucht das Projekt chinesische Konfuzius-Institute in Südafrika. Dabei wird deutlich, dass China durch seine Konfuzius-Institute wesentlich weniger politisch und dirigistisch agiert, als dies die oft negative Mediendarstellung der Konfuzius-Institute als Instrument der chinesischen Expansionspolitik vermitteln will. Konfuzius-Institute versuchen, sich an örtliche Gegebenheiten in Afrika anzupassen und kommunizieren in der Regel ein selektives Bild von China, das bestimmte Aspekte vor allem der traditionellen chinesischen Kultur (Kalligrafie, Teezeremonien) betont und aktuelle politisch-gesellschaftliche Aspekte weitgehend ausblendet. Für Afrikaner stellen die Konfuzius-Institute eine bedeutende Option dar. Sie nutzen die Institute strategisch, um Studienabschlüsse zu „veredeln“ und somit ihre Chancen auf dem Arbeitsmarkt zu erhöhen. Hierbei spielt nicht nur der einheimische Arbeitsmarkt eine Rolle. Vielmehr ist es auch eine wichtige Option für Studierende afrikanischer Konfuzius-Institute, für längere Zeit in China zu studieren oder zu arbeiten. Besonders diese Option ist von Interesse, da sich in China selbst zeigt, ob und wie die Ausbildung an Konfuzius-Instituten auf einen solchen Aufenthalt vorbereitet.

 

Kontakt: 

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Involvierte AFRASO Mitglieder: 

AFRASO Publications

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Talks and Lectures

Falk Hartig ; Cultural Exchange and Image Management: The Case of Confucius Institutes in Africa ; Thursday, January 14, 2016 ; University of Nottingham
Hartig, Falk ; Confucius INstitutes: The Gobalization of Chinese Public Diplomacy - The Case of Africa ; Saturday, July 12, 2014 ; University of Nottingham
Hartig, Falk ; Confucius Institutes in Africa – A new Soft Power Instrument in the Making? ; Thursday, March 26, 2015 ; Kapstadt
Hartig, Falk ; Confucius Institutes and China’s International Image Management ; Sunday, September 28, 2014 ; Rhodes University, Grahamstown
Hartig, Falk ; Confucius Institutes and China’s International Communication ; Wednesday, September 10, 2014 ; China Foreign Affairs University, Peking
Hartig, Falk ; China’s Public Diplomacy: explaining China to the world through external communication and image management ; Thursday, June 26, 2014 ; Westsächsische Hochschule Zwickau
Hartig, Falk ; China‘s Public Diplomacy towards Africa ; Thursday, March 19, 2015 ; School of International and Intercultural Communication, TU Dortmund

S1-C: Afrikanische, asiatische und internationale Akteure im zentralafrikanischen Minensektor (Kamerun und Zentralafrikanische Republik)

Übersicht: 

Zentralafrika gehört hinsichtlich geologischer Ressourcen zu den reichsten Gebieten auf dem Kontinent. Zahlreiche nationale Visionen und Strategien zum Minensektor betonen die Bedeutung von Bergbau, Forst- und Landwirtschaft für zukünftige wirtschaftliche Entwicklungen innerhalb der Teilregion. Rohstoffverbreitung und Akteure wurden durch das AFRASO Teilprojekt S1-C (2013-2016) an zahlreichen Fallbeispielen in Kamerun und der Zentralafrikanischen Republik untersucht. Es konnte gezeigt werden, dass in den letzten 5-10 Jahren der Einfluss asiatischer Investoren im Bergbausektor systematisch gewachsen ist. In der Schlussphase des Teilprojektes sollen die empirischen Ergebnisse systematisiert und materialisiert werden. Dies erfolgt mittels einer vom Teilprojekt veranstalteten „Afrasischen Akteurs- und Rohstoffkonferenz“ in Brazzaville oder in Yaoundé, die einerseits die generelle Gültigkeit der Forschungsergebnisse überprüft, und die lokale Eigentümerschaft (ownership) der betroffenen Akteure stärkt. Schließlich wird ein „Afrasian stakeholder model“ entwickelt, dass die empirischen AFRASO Erkenntnisse auf ein abstraktes Niveau hebt.

Foto: Prof. Dr.  Jürgen Runge

Foto: Prof. Dr. Jürgen Rungen

Foto: Prof. Dr. Jürgen Runge

Kontakt: 

Ort: 

Involvierte AFRASO Mitglieder: 

AFRASO Publications

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Talks and Lectures

Diderot Nguepjouo Megaptche ; Involvement's Strategies of Asian actors in the Central African Mining Sector ; Wednesday, April 16, 2014 ; Hamburg
Runge, Jürgen ; Going for Gold - Naturraum, Nutzungspotentiale und Konflikte in Zentralafrika (Kamerun, ZAR) ; Monday, December 7, 2015 ; Gießener Geographische Gesellschaft (GGG), Gießen
Diderot Nguepjouo Megaptche ; Geographical Subproject on African, Asian, and International Actors in the Central African Mining Sector ; Thursday, June 13, 2013 ; Goethe-Universität Frankfurt
Diderot Nguepjouo Megaptche ; African, Asian, and International Actors in the Central African Mining Sector ; Saturday, June 29, 2013 ; Universität Jena
Runge, Jürgen and Diderot Nguepjouo Megaptche ; African, Asian and international actors in the Central African mining sector. ; Wednesday, March 12, 2014 ; Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Nguepjouo, Diderot ; African geological resources and the Millennium Development Goals: the case of Cameroon ; Friday, June 26, 2015 ; Frankfurt a. M.

S3-A: Chinese Cultural Policies and Confucius Institutes in Africa

Übersicht: 


In order to clarify to what extent cultural interactions in African-Chinese relations create a “soft“ influence on new development concepts and how China presents itself by means of public diplomacy to African audiences, the project investigates Confucius Institutes in South Africa. Other than negative media reports suggest, Confucius Institutes act less political. Moreover, it seems inaccurate to describe them as an instrument of China’s policy of expansion. Confucius Institutes adapt themselves to local circumstances in Africa and communicate a rather selective picture of China which normally focuses on traditional notions of culture (calligraphy, tea ceremony) and tends to blind out current political and societal issues.

For Africans, Confucius Institutes are a major option to purify their university degrees and thereby to increase their chances on the job market. In this regard, China is a major option for students of African Confucius Institutes as a destination to study and work. Precisely this option is of interest because in China, it becomes obvious whether and how Confucius Institutes prepare their students for such a stay abroad.

 


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Involvierte AFRASO Mitglieder: 

AFRASO Publications

Hartig, Falk ; 2016 ; Chinese Public Diplomacy: The Rise of the Confucius Institute. Oxon/New York ; Hartig, Falk ; Routledge ; Oxon / New York
Hartig, Falk ; 2015 ; China’s Re-emergence: Reasons, Consequences and Prospects ; Europe-Asia Studies ; 67 (10) ; 1709–1712
Hartig, Falk ; 2014 ; Chinas Geopolitik und ihre kulturelle Unterstützung ; WIKA-Report Kulturelle Faktoren der Geopolitik ; Bauer, Gerd Ulrich; Thum, Bernd ; Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen ; 64-69
Hartig, Falk ; 2015 ; China’s Confucius Institutes aren’t perfect but have much to offer Africa ; The Conversation ; December 3, 2015 ; https://theconversation.com/chinas-confucius-institutes-arent-perfect-but-have-much-to-offer-africa-51596

Pages

Talks and Lectures

Hartig, Falk ; Is it the Economy, Stupid? China Daily and the Representation of China abroad ; Tuesday, September 2, 2014 to Wednesday, September 3, 2014 ; Tsinghua University Beijing
Hartig, Falk ; Cultural organizations and mutual learning: the case of Confucius Institutes ; Friday, September 20, 2013 ; Clingendael Institute Netherlands Institute for International Relations, Den Haag
Falk Hartig ; Cultural Exchange and Image Management: The Case of Confucius Institutes in Africa ; Thursday, January 14, 2016 ; University of Nottingham
Hartig, Falk ; Confucius INstitutes: The Gobalization of Chinese Public Diplomacy - The Case of Africa ; Saturday, July 12, 2014 ; University of Nottingham
Hartig, Falk ; Confucius Institutes: The Globalization of Chinese Soft Power – the Case of (South) Africa ; Friday, February 28, 2014 ; USC Center on Public Diplomacy, University of Southern California, Los Angeles
Hartig, Falk ; Confucius Institutes in Africa – A new Soft Power Instrument in the Making? ; Thursday, March 26, 2015 ; Kapstadt
Flew, Terry & Falk Hartig ; Confucius Institutes and the Network Communication Approach to Public Diplomacy ; Wednesday, July 3, 2013 to Friday, July 5, 2013 ; Perth
Hartig, Falk ; Confucius Institutes and China’s Public Diplomacy – A western Perspective ; Thursday, December 19, 2013 ; Zhou Enlai School of Government, Nankai University, Tianjin
Hartig, Falk ; Confucius Institutes and China’s International Image Management ; Sunday, September 28, 2014 ; Rhodes University, Grahamstown
Hartig, Falk ; Confucius Institutes and China’s International Communication ; Wednesday, September 10, 2014 ; China Foreign Affairs University, Peking
Hartig, Falk ; China’s Public Diplomacy: explaining China to the world through external communication and image management ; Thursday, June 26, 2014 ; Westsächsische Hochschule Zwickau
Hartig, Falk ; China‘s Public Diplomacy towards Africa ; Thursday, March 19, 2015 ; School of International and Intercultural Communication, TU Dortmund
Hartig, Falk ; Chinas Geopolitik und ihre kulturelle Unterstützung ; Thursday, July 18, 2013 to Friday, July 19, 2013 ; Karlsruher Institut für Technologie (KIT)

S2-A: Trade Networks and Migration Between Africa and Asia

Übersicht: 

While the activities of Africans in Asia are often overlooked; Asian – especially Chinese – engagement in Africa has become a focal point of interest in Western public discourse. This project explores the differences between the organization of African and Asian networks. It investigates the types of networks (from family to international enterprises), the sectors of trade and mutual impacts of different cultural practices on interactions and decisions. The focus on cultural and economic repercussion of trade, as it is perceived from the local actors’ point of view, allows to study the organization of trade networks, the development of entrepreneurial strategies, as well as the establishment of migrant trader communities.

The project’s focus on anthropological methodology and epistemological interest is the basis for the comparison within the project, even though the conditions in the research countries differ.

The key research questions of the project are as follows: What kind of trade do African and Asian states support? What are the ideological and historical themes that characterize the policies of these countries? What can be found out about the experiences of migration that Africans and Asians encounters in the respective foreign cultural context? Do these experiences differ from those made migrants in Europe? To which extent have these processes modified trade and contributed to the formation of new networks? What kind of discourses have been developed about the activities of Asians in Africa and vice versa? How do Africans evaluate the infrastructural development and the provision of goods in contrast to the increasing presence of strangers? How is competition for African enterprises created and whose cultural difference is often interpreted negatively? Do these evaluations have an impact on the trade networks? How is trade organized on the level of personal interaction?

One major research focus of the project lies on trade goods in order to find answers to these questions mentioned above. Following particular items like tea not only enables the project to understand supply chains from Chinese producers over traders in import and export to the market mechanisms in West African countries like Mali. This approach also reveals insight in the long history of trade and transformation of Green Tea from a mere product to a cultural practice, which is deeply rooted in Malian society today and becomes increasingly prominent in adjacent countries. A case study in Thailand among Malians, who trade with precious stones, revealed that Africans establish networks in Asia through modifying and adapting successful models that were developed in an African context. These activities give a clear idea about “African agency” in trade. Furthermore, they reverse simplistic notions of Africa only being the receiver of processed goods and exporting raw material.

Another focus of research are the activities of Chinese traders in South Africa. Thousands of Chinese traders arrived in the last 25 years from mainland China. While first-comers benefitted from the high demand in low-priced consumer goods; market saturation and macro-economic tendencies influence and transform the Chinese trader communities nowadays. Traders who have developed a sense for the demands in South Africa, found niches or were able to diversify their businesses, do have an advantage. These activities go often hand in hand with development of social, cultural and political ties in the host countries, where a relatively stable community of Chinese does already exist or is in the making. In all cases, the research showed that successful trade often depends on highly skilled brokers, not only in the economic arena, but also as cultural intermediaries. Researching interpersonal relationships allows to paint a profoundly more complex picture than mere generalizations of Asian/African dependencies, which this project aims to do.

Research is carried out in West Africa (Cameroon, Mali) and in South Africa as well as in Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Japan, and China. The broad regional choice provides opportunities for the comparison of historically and culturally divergent regions.

The research is conducted by the following team of scholars:

Ute Röschenthaler researches in close cooperation with Antoine Socpa Cameroonian and Malaysian trade networks, in cooperation with Birama Diakon the network of Malian and Chinese traders in Mali and China, and with Shigehiro Sasaki African trade networks in Japan. Mamadou Diawara explores Malian migrants in Indonesia and returnees in Bamako. Matthias Gruber researches Chinese/South African trade networks in South Africa.


Kontakt: 

Ort: 

Involvierte AFRASO Mitglieder: 

AFRASO Publications

-

Talks and Lectures

Röschenthaler, Ute & Julia Binter ; Trade, crisis and cultural entrepreneurship in the Niger Delta and the Cross River Region ; Saturday, October 3, 2015 ; Marburg
Diawara, Mamadou ; The Time-Tested Traditionist: Intellectual Trajectory and Mediation from the Early Empires to the Present Day. Landscapes, Sources and Intellectual Projects: Politics, History and the West African Past ; Thursday, November 12, 2015 to Saturday, November 14, 2015 ; Department of African Studies and Anthropology (DASA) and Centre of West African Studies (CWAS), University of Birmingham
Ute Röschenthaler ; The History of Green Tea in Mali and Beyond ; Thursday, May 15, 2014 ; Goethe-Universität Frankfurt
Ute Röschenthaler ; The History of Green Tea in Africa ; Thursday, December 18, 2014 ; Bejing University
Diawara, Mamadou ; The Call of the ‘Bush’: Malian Migrants on their Way to Asia ; Wednesday, March 12, 2014 ; Kuala Lumpur
Diawara, Mamadou ; Seeing like scholars. Whose exile? Making a life in being at home and abroad ; Wednesday, March 25, 2015 ; Kapstadt
Ute Röschenthaler ; Commercial Networks and Cultural Brokers: Cameroonian Traders in China ; Wednesday, March 12, 2014 ; Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Diawara, Mamadou ; China und Afrika, SoSe 2013 ; Goethe University Frankfurt
Röschenthaler, Ute; Haugen, Heide & Michaela Pelican ; Challenges to African entrepreneurship in Malaysia ; Thursday, July 9, 2015 ; Sorbonne, Paris
Ute Röschenthaler ; Brokers as Intermediaries in Commercial Trade Networks ; Sunday, December 14, 2014 ; Jinan University, Guangzhou
Röschenthaler, Ute ; Bewegung von Menschen und Gütern im globalen Kontext ; Wednesday, July 1, 2015 ; Hannover
Diawara, Mamadou ; Bangkok as a "Bush". Preliminary findings on African migrants facing Asia ; Tuesday, April 1, 2014 ; Thammasat University
Diawara, Mamadou ; Asien in Afrika, WiSe 2014/15
Diawara, Mamadou ; Asia as Horizon and Home for West Africans from the 1980s ; Saturday, August 8, 2015 ; Stellenbosch Institute for Advanced Study
Diawara, Mamadou ; (Dis-)connections in Histories of African Studies on the Continent and Beyond, ; Friday, July 10, 2015 ; Sorbonne, Paris

S1-C: African, Asian and International Actors in Central African Mining Sector (Cameroon & Central Africa Republic)

Übersicht: 

Central Africa is one of the richest areas relating to geological resources on the continent. Several national mining visions and strategies conclude that mining, forestry and agriculture are the key industries for future economic development in the sub-region. Commodities distribution and stakeholders as well as their interrelationships have been comprehensively studied within the physical-geography AFRASO sub-project S1-C between 2013-2016 by manifold show cases in Cameroon and in Central African Republic. In July 2016, the third AFRASO documentary film will give a profound insight into living and working conditions of artisanal miners and the Asian influence. The film will be presented to the public during the third international AFRASO conference in Frankfurt in September 2016. The ongoing field mapping and stakeholder analysis within the sub-project highlights the increasing dominance of Asian actors in professional and artisanal mining in Central Africa. This will be used to set up a general stakeholder's model for the extractive sector.

During this project – which was consequently underpinned by the on-site fieldwork of a Cameroonian PhD candidate – it was found out that government owned and private Asian investors systematically gained more influence in this sector over the last 5–10 years. The other objective of the sub-project’s ongoing activities is to materialize these findings by organizing an “Afrasia Stakeholder and Commodities Conference” in Yaoundé in 2018 to focus on the general validity and to strengthen ownership of local actors, and finally, setting up an “Afrasian stakeholder’s model” to transform empirical AFRASO findings on an abstraction level.

Picture taken by Prof. Dr. Jürgen Runge

Picture taken by Prof. Dr. Jürgen Runge

Picture taken by Prof. Dr.  Jürgen Runge

 

Kontakt: 

Ort: 

Involvierte AFRASO Mitglieder: 

AFRASO Publications

-

Talks and Lectures

Diderot Nguepjouo Megaptche ; Involvement's Strategies of Asian actors in the Central African Mining Sector ; Wednesday, April 16, 2014 ; Hamburg
Runge, Jürgen ; Going for Gold - Naturraum, Nutzungspotentiale und Konflikte in Zentralafrika (Kamerun, ZAR) ; Monday, December 7, 2015 ; Gießener Geographische Gesellschaft (GGG), Gießen
Diderot Nguepjouo Megaptche ; Geographical Subproject on African, Asian, and International Actors in the Central African Mining Sector ; Thursday, June 13, 2013 ; Goethe-Universität Frankfurt
Diderot Nguepjouo Megaptche ; African, Asian, and International Actors in the Central African Mining Sector ; Saturday, June 29, 2013 ; Universität Jena
Runge, Jürgen and Diderot Nguepjouo Megaptche ; African, Asian and international actors in the Central African mining sector. ; Wednesday, March 12, 2014 ; Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Nguepjouo, Diderot ; African geological resources and the Millennium Development Goals: the case of Cameroon ; Friday, June 26, 2015 ; Frankfurt a. M.