The global geoeconomic volatility wrought by the second Donald Trump US presidency and hostilities in the Middle East make the shift in China’s Africa strategy even more important for China and for Africa.
China’s Africa strategy started to shift in 2019, towards investment. It is anchored in Hunan Province.
The “Hunan Model” emerged because the “Angola Model” (building infrastructure and extracting resources) faced sustainability hurdles. Given the vulnerability of African countries to shocks, they often struggle to keep up with mounting debt repayments. The other factor was China’s changing domestic needs.
Traditional trade partnership and growth corridors were also under increasing contestation and subject to high trade barriers.
Under these pressures, Beijing selected Hunan Province to become its “project implementation unit” for a new era of trade and development between China and Africa.
The model has become more important since formal approval of the China-Africa Economic and Trade Deep Cooperation Pilot Zone in early 2024 and the growth of the China-Africa Economic and Trade Exhibition since launch in 2019.
It seeks to deepen and bring greater balance to China-Africa trade and industrial integration. It is also at the heart of efforts to overcome the three main barriers to African development – shortages of capital, skilled labour and infrastructure – while offering China a secure and growing supply of resources.
Based on years of study of China-Africa trade relations, I argue that the tensions in the Middle East and the economic disruptions they have caused globally will speed up China’s thrust towards renewables and the electrification of its economy. It will also accelerate its push for new markets. This has implications for Africa.
Hunan Province is central to green transportation and to construction, heavy industry and minerals processing. It is also central to China’s economic relations with Africa.
What Hunan is all about
At the centre of the Hunan Model sit two national policy initiatives:
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the China-Africa Economic and Trade Deep Cooperation Pilot Zone. This is a logistics, trade and investment system designed to integrate Chinese and African supply chains and economic development.
Hunan Province’s capital, Changsha, is home to China’s third-largest wholesale market, the Gaoqiao Grand Market. It is the primary distribution hub for non-commodity African imports landing in and near Changsha and passing through “green lanes” that fast-track African exports into China.
The market has a permanent trade facilitation hall where African countries market their goods directly and which provides other trade services.
The Hunan Model also has three functional areas to support trade between land-locked Hunan and the world, with an emphasis on Africa:
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Changsha Free Trade Airport Zone, a national airfreight hub. It has new routes, such as the Changsha-Addis Ababa cargo line launched in 2022.
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Yueyang Chenglingji Port connects Hunan’s heavy industries (timber, machinery) to the sea via the Yangtze River.
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Changsha Jinxia Economic Zone focuses on non-rail sea trade from Hunan to Guangdong and onward.
The China-Africa cooperation zone also has five “functional clusters” that drive trade, investment and industrial development between and within China and African nations. These target specific sectors where Hunan excels – and that match potential for growth and industrialisation in Africa. Construction machinery, mining equipment and precious metals processing are among them.
The China-Africa Economic and Trade Exhibition comprises the permanent exhibition hall in the zone and a series of trade expos, held in China and in Africa.
In the last few years, as I’ve detailed in a journal article, a series of China-Africa Economic and Trade Exhibition events have also begun springing up in African countries, including Kenya and Nigeria.
Impact of Middle East conflict
The importance of the Hunan Model has, arguably, been increased by the second Trump presidency and intensifying US-China trade tensions. As western markets become more restrictive, China has pivoted towards the global south with remarkable speed. Africa is no exception. In 2025, while Chinese total foreign trade grew by 3.8%, China-Africa trade surged by 17.7%.
Read more:
US trade wars with China – and how they play out in Africa
More recently, tensions in the Middle East have offered a dramatic shock to the global economy and its energy supply chains. This is likely to intensify China’s push towards renewables and electrification of its economy. It may also elevate global demand for electric vehicles, and it is Hunan Province that is home to Chinese e-vehicle giant BYD.
Given Hunan’s centrality to China’s own renewables industry, especially electric transformation and minerals processing, as well as construction, the Hunan Model can drive a new renewables-run era in China and between China and Africa too.
Read more:
China’s interests in Africa are being shaped by the race for renewable energy
In 2025, the “biggest highlight” of Changsha’s exports to Africa was the explosive growth of the “new three items”. These are lithium batteries, electric vehicles and photovoltaic products. Hunan’s exports of these items to Africa increased by 160.4%, 840.4% and 62.1% year-on-year, respectively. That’s why they have become a “new calling card” for Hunan’s exports to Africa.
Alongside electric transportation companies like BYD, Hunan Province is also home to electric railway giants like CRRC, which is at the heart of a “green” rail export surge. Moreover, in the wake of conflict in Iran, China has announced a new rare minerals research and innovation hub, to be set up in Changsha, Hunan.
Avoiding ‘Africa last’
While the Hunan model offers a focus on surmounting non-tariff barriers to trade and an industrial-focused alternative to past extraction-heavy policies, risks remain. The sheer scale of Chinese exports to Africa – up 17.7% in 2025 while African exports to China grew only 5.4% – underscores a growing trade imbalance.
African countries and sub-regions must build their own industrial supply chains, as China did with investment from earlier industrial giants.
The Hunan Model has its own research alliance of Chinese scholars and industry experts to inform its advance and progress. African nations require their own equivalent.
Shock after shock is upsetting the world economy. The Hunan Model is no longer just an experiment or a policy idea. It is driving China-Africa economic transformation. It offers potential for growth and development in China and Africa.
Lauren Johnston does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.