Chapter 11 Chapter 10 Looking at how modern European and American imperialism plunders Africa: One of the real reasons why foreign media criticize China’s African strategy

Imperialism is the highest stage of capitalism The export of commodities was typical of the old capitalism, where free competition ruled completely.Typical of the newest capitalisms, where monopoly reigns, is the export of capital. (Lenin: "Imperialism is the Highest Stage of Capitalism" People's Publishing House, April 2001, 3rd Edition, p. 53) What is imperialism?Imperialism means not only wanting natural resources, but also firmly controlling everything from agriculture to industry to various profitable industries. True imperialism is not about controlling industries. This level is too rudimentary. True imperialism is about controlling a country and nation ideologically, and making you completely dependent on the suzerain in terms of industry.

If the international price of cocoa or coffee falls sharply, or the international food price rises sharply, then Côte d'Ivoire will not have enough foreign exchange to buy food from the United States, Europe or Australia, and famine and turmoil will occur in the country.Under such circumstances, do you dare not rely on the suzerain country? Why let little Mitterrand come to Africa?France, which has colonized Africa for a long time, has huge political, economic and military interests in Africa, and has many dark-box deals with local interest groups. On the afternoon of November 8, 2009, in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, Wen Jiabao was asked by reporters at a Chinese and foreign press conference: "China is only interested in Africa's natural resources. What do you think?" Wen Jiabao replied: China goes to Africa. It is the plundering of resources and the so-called "neo-colonial (imperial)ism". This kind of argument has been around for a long time, and it is not worth refuting.Premier Wen's answer is very high-profile, and it is also commensurate with his status as the prime minister of a big country.

So, as an economist, what should I do if I am asked this question at a meeting of the International Monetary Fund or the World Bank?My Jin replied solemnly: Yes, we are really only interested in natural resources, and sorry, our ambition may not be as big as you said, in fact, natural resources are not even mentioned, we are mainly Interested in Africa's energy and mineral resources, and willing to purchase these resources at prices agreed by Africa.So please tell me, how did you imperialist countries plunder Africa? What is imperialism?Imperialism means not only wanting natural resources, but also firmly controlling everything from agriculture to industry to various profitable industries, such as the destructive manipulation of the agricultural industry in Africa.And we will never do this, we just trade with African friends on an equal footing, and the trade price is not manipulated by us, but negotiated on an equal footing.

Let me give you an example to help you understand what real imperialism is.There is a country called Côte d'Ivoire, which used to be a French colony.In fact, the name of this country was given by the French, which means Ivory Coast in French, because the ivory hunted by the French from Africa was shipped from here and sold to Europe.Although the colonial system has long since died out, France's influence in Côte d'Ivoire still cannot be underestimated.Electricity, telecommunications, energy and other industries that are related to the national economy and people's livelihood are still monopolized by French capital.For example, the controlling party of Côte d’Ivoire Telecom is France Telecom. The ORANGFI, AVISO and other companies under the former use French products, thus setting the threshold for products from other countries. Communication equipment providers like my country’s Huawei are developing The Cote d'Ivoire market encountered great difficulties.

True imperialism is not about controlling industries. This level is too rudimentary. True imperialism is about controlling a country and nation ideologically, making you completely dependent on the suzerain country in terms of industry.Therefore, the French rulers pursued two basic policies ideologically, one was assimilation and the other was association.Assimilation means to give priority to the use of French in all areas of the colonies, and to follow the French system in all aspects of system, law, and social management.Relevance means that in all aspects concerning the native people, local customs and customs can only be preserved if they are consistent with French interests.

Even after the war, France realized that the independence of Côte d'Ivoire was hard to avoid, so the de Gaulle government decided to make Côte d'Ivoire independent in a planned way.After this formal independence, the colony will still remain within the political and cultural influence of France to the maximum extent.Therefore, France's "nussion civilisatrice" (nussion civilisatrice) shoulders the important task of spreading culture in Africa.What is the psychology behind this?It is the French people's very high self-esteem for their own culture!The French are famous for this, if you are traveling in Paris, asking for directions in English will not work, not because the French do not understand English, you ask them, they will answer, but all in French, so In fact, they clearly understood, but they just refused to lower their proud heads and answer in English.

Thought is the foundation, and the economy is the real key.In fact, Côte d'Ivoire is a very interesting country. After independence in the 1960s, it became more dependent on France. Before independence, Côte d'Ivoire only had more than 30,000 French people, but after independence, there were more than 60,000 French people.You must know that the population of Côte d’Ivoire at that time was only about 10 million, and most of these French people were lawyers, teachers, managers, and economic and technical consultants. In other words, almost all the management of Côte d’Ivoire were French.A large number of French citizens continue to work in Ivorian public institutions, especially in positions related to the economy.Within just a few years of independence, there were more French people working in Côte d'Ivoire than at any point during the colonial period.

So how do the French do it?Engage in an export-oriented economy!The French made Côte d'Ivoire's cocoa production and export number one in the world, coffee production number one in Africa, and number four in the world.In fact, Côte d'Ivoire's economy was as good as China's today. Its average annual GDP growth rate was 6.17% in the 1960s, and Gao Yongping even reached 13.67% in the 1970s.But 20 years have passed, and since the 1980s, the annual growth rate has been about two percentage points, and it has to retreat a lot to catch up with any crisis. Isn't that weird?For Europeans and Americans, their dependence on coffee is similar to their dependence on cheap socks produced in China. You don’t have to buy socks every day, but you must drink coffee every day.Similarly, cocoa is an essential raw material for making chocolate, and Europeans cannot do without it, so why is Côte d'Ivoire still so passive?

Comparative advantage is the most important concept in international trade theory. Simply put, it is: instead of you and I both producing apples and pears, it is better for me to produce apples with lower cost, and you to produce pears with lower cost, and then we take apples and pears Make an exchange so that everyone gets cheaper apples and pears.This theory sounds good, but it has been distorted by imperialist countries. However, the reality of the world economic pattern is that the three economies of the United States, Europe, and Japan all subsidize their own agriculture with industry, especially the cultivation of grain and cotton, and quasi-grain agricultural products like milk. Therefore, their costs very low.In this way, African countries can only be forced to grow cash crops, because if African countries grow wheat, the price will definitely not be able to compete with the heavily subsidized American wheat or Australian wheat.Under the dogma of so-called comparative advantage, Côte d'Ivoire can only grow low-cost cocoa and coffee.The final result is that the planting area of ​​cocoa and coffee accounts for 60% of the country's arable land; more than 4 million people are engaged in cocoa and coffee business-related activities, accounting for 25% of the country's population; 10%; 30% to 40% of the national tax revenue comes from the cocoa and coffee cattle industry; the export revenue of the two accounts for 42% of the country's total exports.

What problems does this cause?The cocoa and coffee industries play a pivotal role in the economy of Côte d'Ivoire, and their ups and downs affect the pulse of the entire economy of Côte d'Ivoire.In other words, if the international price of cocoa or coffee fell sharply, or the international food price rose sharply, then Côte d'Ivoire would not have enough foreign exchange to buy food from the United States, Europe or Australia, and famine and unrest would occur in the country.Under such circumstances, do you dare not rely on the suzerain country?You do not dare! So, how to make the international price of cocoa or coffee fall abnormally suddenly and sharply?The way is to lobby African countries to carry out reforms, privatize under the guise of economic development, and then use international sanctions to control the import and export of African countries, thereby controlling prices.

After Côte d'Ivoire's independence, the government established an organization called the "National Fund for Supporting Agricultural Production and Stabilizing Prices" to manage the country's agriculture.With this organization, the growers lose the autonomy of production and pricing, while the government can obtain a lot of money through monopoly.This period of "fund" management is actually the period of the fastest GDP growth rate in Côte d'Ivoire mentioned above.The reason for this is that the government has a monopoly on purchasing and importing and exporting.But in fact, this period also created a lot of social problems, that is, most of the wealth flowed into the hands of government officials and was used for corruption, and the people did not get the benefits of the so-called "economic growth" at all. These problems came to light over time, and growers came forward, calling for reform.At this time, there was also a wave of privatization in the world, so the Ivorian government was forced to relax the state monopoly on cocoa and coffee.In 1999, the International Monetary Fund imposed sanctions on Côte d'Ivoire, forcing the Côte d'Ivoire government to carry out reforms.Of course, the result of the reform is that the government returns the management rights of cocoa and coffee to the growers, and the government only collects two kinds of taxes: one is a flat tax, the tax rate of cocoa is 220 francs/kg, and the tax rate of coffee is 10 francs /kg; the other is the registration tax, which is 5% for both cocoa and coffee. The next thing is that foreign-funded enterprises came to Côte d'Ivoire with great fanfare under the banner of privatization, and they easily controlled the cocoa and coffee industries in this African country.There are only four cocoa factories in Côte d'Ivoire, all of which are foreign-funded, and their processing capacity is only about 18% of the cocoa output.Côte d'Ivoire has fewer coffee processing factories, only one, which is also foreign-funded, and its processing capacity is only about 12% of the coffee output. The following is a list of cocoa processing companies in Côte d'Ivoire: 1. SACO, a subsidiary of the Swiss BARRY-CALLEBAUT Group, has 3 processing plants with an annual processing capacity of about 100,000 tons of cocoa beans; 2. UNICAO, a subsidiary of the American ADM Group, one of the four major grain merchants, has a processing plant with an annual processing capacity of about 90,000 tons of cocoa beans; 3. MICAO, a subsidiary of the American Cargill Group, one of the four major grain merchants, has a processing plant with an annual processing capacity of about 100,000 tons of cocoa beans; 4. CEMOICI, a subsidiary of the French CEMOI Group, has a processing plant with an annual processing capacity of about 60,000 tons of cocoa beans. The following is a list of coffee processing companies in Côte d'Ivoire: 5. CAPRA/NESTLE, a subsidiary of the Swiss Nestlé Group, has a processing plant with an annual processing capacity of about 30,000 tons of coffee beans. benefit service But why do these foreign-funded enterprises have such a big influence in Côte d'Ivoire?First of all, they arranged a large number of economic consultants and political consultants to directly participate in the government operations of Côte d'Ivoire.Once the Ivorian government is disobedient, it will support pro-French anti-government forces.If the opposition cannot overthrow the current government, they may simply send troops to dissolve the government.Dear readers, it will be clear if you read the following real events. This is the inside story of the 2004 Côte d'Ivoire conflict. President Gbagbo of Côte d'Ivoire set up a "Youth Patriotic Army". What is it used for?One is to protest Chirac's support for the armed opposition, and the other is to intimidate those French nationals in Côte d'Ivoire.The "Youth Patriotic Army" took advantage of the internal disagreements among the opposition to launch air strikes against the reactionaries.France was very annoyed after knowing it, so it waited for an excuse to do something. On November 6, 2004, the excuse finally came.In the afternoon, the 120th Army of the Ivorian government attacked a French army position in the rebel-controlled area. As a result, nine Frenchmen and one American were killed.As a result, without saying a word, the French army shot down four fighter jets, five armed helicopters and a transport helicopter of the Ivorian government army, completely destroying the Ivorian air force.Immediately afterwards, France announced to the international community that "the situation in Côte d'Ivoire is becoming increasingly tense. In order to protect the safety of French citizens, three Mirage F1 fighter jets have been deployed to the French Air Force Base in Libreville, the capital of Gabon."The French Ministry of Defense then sent more than 300 soldiers to Côte d'Ivoire to reinforce the local French peacekeeping force. On November 8, 2004, French armed forces occupied the area around the Presidential Palace in Côte d'Ivoire. Let's take a look at the so-called "Angola Gate" incident that was heard by the Paris Criminal Court on October 6, 2008, which further revealed to us how France manipulated the former colonial countries.In the so-called "Angolagate" incident, more than 40 defendants are suspected of smuggling arms to Angola during the Angolan civil war in the 1990s. The list of defendants in this case includes a string of big names such as: Jacques Attahout, adviser to Mitterrand and Sarkozy; Arkady Gadamac, an international arms broker; Pierre Falcone, A wealthy French businessman who was once the chairman of the largest oil company in Angola and an international arms broker; Charles Pasgua, former Minister of the Interior; Paul Rupp Sulitzer, a French writer.Of course, there is one person in this list, which is even more eye-catching. He is Mitterrand Yun's son and former adviser on African affairs at the Elysee Palace, Jean-Christopher Mitterrand (also known as Mitterrand Jr.). In 1973, the 27-year-old Mitterrand Jr. was sent to West Africa as a reporter for Agence France-Presse. He stayed in West Africa for nine years and became an "African expert".In 1981, Mitterrand was elected President of France. Two years later, he arranged for his son to serve as an assistant to Payne, the president's African affairs adviser. In 1986, he kicked Payne away and replaced him with his son.From 1986 to 1992, Mitterrand Jr. was undoubtedly an important figure on the African political scene. Why let little Mitterrand come to Africa?France, which has colonized Africa for a long time, has huge political, economic and military interests in Africa, and has many dark-box deals with local interest groups. Therefore, the French president always appoints cronies to act as his spokesperson in Africa.When it came to little Mitterrand, he was bold and dared to do anything, and he had "my dad said" as a shield for everything. In the 1980s and 1990s, France took many major actions in Africa, such as helping Zaire The Mobutu government dealt with the Cuban mercenaries, and helped the Chad Chabre government deal with the Libyan army, all without the important participation of the young Mitterrand. He set up a line with the arms dealer, first met Falcone through Marziani, an adviser to the former Minister of the Interior, and then met Gaidamark.These men started smuggling arms in Angola as early as the 1980s.After the little Mitterrand with a special identity was dragged into the water, he used his position to open the door for illegal arms transactions.In 1993 and 1994, he received kickbacks of US$1.8 million from the Angolan government.According to experts, the detonators and landmines in these illegal arms transactions are enough to cause the death of 500,000 to 1 million people in Angola during the civil war, most of whom are innocent civilians in the war zone.There was also the Rwandan civil war in 1990, where the arms trade was also full of the little Mitterrand. When it comes to Mitterrand Jr., there is another one I have to mention, that is Mrs Thatcher's son Thatcher Jr.He was arrested in South Africa on 25 August 2004 on suspicion of involvement in a coup in Equatorial Guinea.According to the "Guardian", Thatcher Jr. acted as a middleman in the 20 billion pound arms deal between the British government and the Saudi government in 1985.After the incident was disclosed, Mrs. Thatcher asked her son to deny all allegations related to the transaction, and arranged for him to move to South Africa to continue his luxurious life. Therefore, if I have the opportunity to answer the question posed by the Western journalists in this chapter, I will add one more sentence: We will not plunder Africa for what it is worth, like our predecessors in the West, leaving only a continent of abject poverty.In order to realize our values ​​- to thoroughly improve the living conditions of the local people by sharing the fruits of economic development, we will use the money we earn from the local area to build roads, build hospitals, and run schools. In a word, we will give back to Africa the people, not corrupt officials.We believe that such dividends for the development of African people will be more effective than embargoes and sanctions imposed by Western countries, unrealistic political conditions and even military intervention.