Skip to Initiative for U.S.-China Dialogue on Global Issues Full Site Menu Skip to main content
Georgetown University Logo

Initiative for U.S.-China Dialogue on Global Issues

December 4, 2024

Chinese Lending to the Global South: A Boon for Development or Gateway to Debt Collection?

Event Series: China and the Global South

RSVP Required
A shipping port and container vessel.

The announcement of the Belt and Road Initiative splashed China onto the world’s overseas lending scene. In the more than a decade since, Beijing has become a major lender to the developing world. This webinar brings together a panel of experts to discuss how Chinese development lending has responded in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic. Our panelists will explore the range of industries in which China continues to invest, the preferred vehicles for lending, as well as similarities and differences across regional recipients. 

This event is co-sponsored by the Initiative for U.S.-China Dialogue on Global Issues at Georgetown University and the Africa-China Initiative. 

Featured 

Christian-Géraud Neema is the Africa editor of the China-Global South Project and a nonresident scholar in the Carnegie Africa Program. He is an expert analyst on China-Africa relations. His research focused on natural resources revenue management in resources-rich countries. He is a frequent commentator and contributor on China’s engagement in the mining sector in Africa and the political economy of the mining sector of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). 

Rebecca Ray is a senior academic researcher at the Boston University Global Development Policy Center. She leads the Forests, Agriculture and Indigenous Rights in the Belt and Road Initiative (FAIR-BRI) workstream, which produces policy-relevant research on local social and environmental risks and impacts of Chinese overseas economic activity. She also leads GDP Center research on China in Latin America. She oversees the annual China-Latin America and the Caribbean Economic Bulletin series.

Sheng Zhang is a leading research analyst at the Chinese Development Finance Program (CDFP) at AidData. He specializes in development finance, infrastructure projects, and Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) research. His work advances AidData’s mission to deepen global understanding of sustainable development and investment practices while significantly enhancing the program’s capacity to generate detailed insights into development finance through advanced geocoding techniques. Sheng is also a co-author of the AidData report “Harboring Global Ambitions,” which explores China’s global ports footprint and its implications for future naval bases.

Evan Medeiros (moderator) is the Penner Family Chair in Asian Studies at the School of Foreign Service and a senior fellow with the Initiative for U.S.-China Dialogue on Global Issues at Georgetown University. Medeiros has in-depth experience in U.S. policy toward the Asia-Pacific from his time on the National Security Council as director for China, Taiwan and Mongolia, and then as special assistant to the president and senior director for Asia under President Barack Obama.