Yellen begins the Biden administration’s visits to Africa | NASCAR Racing News

Yellen’s travels will take her from a business incubator for entrepreneurs in Senegal to agricultural outposts in Zambia to a wildlife park and a Ford assembly plant in South Africa, each stop designed to highlight areas of African-American collaboration. You’ll also connect with a lot of top African officials along the way.

Yellen arrived in Dakar, Senegal, late Wednesday and began her public schedule on Friday.

At the business incubator on Friday, Yellen plans to stress that Africa, with its growing middle class, will “shape the course of the global economy for the next century,” offering important opportunities for the United States.

Yellen plans to say, according to excerpts from her prepared remarks released Thursday, “This could be a win-win for our economies.”

Africa will account for a quarter of the world’s population by 2050 and is rich in natural resources.

And China’s growing economic entrenchment in Africa is spurring the United States to deepen ties.

Before arriving in Africa, Yelin met her Chinese his counterpart, Liu He, in Switzerland on Wednesday as part of an effort to ease tensions with the Asian superpower.

Her job on the circuit more than 13,000 miles (20,000 km) from Washington to Zurich, Dakar, Lusaka, Pretoria and back home is to connect with African leaders and offer investment opportunities to American companies.

Yellen plans to say, “The growing share of people of working age represents an opportunity for the continent. More workers can drive growth, generate more resources for increased investment, and make it easier to educate young people and support the vulnerable.”

She plans to point out that Africa’s growing middle class also presents an opportunity for the US “It means a bigger market for products. And that means more investment opportunities for US companies that are already creating jobs on the continent.”

the White House strategy In sub-Saharan Africa, he raises concerns about China’s involvement in the region, noting that Beijing “views the region as an important arena to challenge the rules-based international order, advance its narrow commercial and geopolitical interests, undermine transparency and openness, and weaken US relations with African people and governments.” “.

Yellen’s stop in Zambia would serve as a highlight of its huge debt to China, its largest creditor. Zambia is renegotiating its $6 billion in debt, and Yellen is critical of China’s failure to make progress in the negotiations. It said in December that it was necessary to find a solution to Zambia’s debt problem “as soon as possible”.

A senior Treasury official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations, told reporters that Yellen discussed Zambia’s debt with Liu on Wednesday and tried to gauge reasons for China’s reluctance to reschedule the debt.

Joseph Siegel, who leads the Africa Center for Strategic Studies research program, said the scope of Yellen’s visit was much broader than the question of China’s influence.

“From an emerging markets standpoint, there is a lot going on there – with its resources, its growth, and a large African diaspora in the US, it can be argued that the US has not paid enough attention to Africa with the rigor that is required,” he said. “I think the significance of this trip is in trying to correct the lack of high-level engagement on the part of the United States in Africa.”

He added that African countries do not want to be placed in a position where they have to choose between China and the United States, but prefer to “maximize” their options and build long-term partnerships.

Africa has 30% of the critical minerals that power the modern world, including 40% of the world’s gold, up to 90% of its chromium and platinum, and the world’s largest reserves of cobalt, diamonds, platinum, and uranium, according to the United Nations Environment Programme.

Rama Yade, Senior Director of the Atlantic Council’s Africa Center, wrote this week The Biden administration can be believed when it says it does not seek to turn Africa into an arena of great power competition.

“Africa will not have to choose between potential partners,” Yade said. “If you can make up for the loss and build on what you started with the December summit, the United States and Africa will prosper.”