China’s foreign minister Wang Yi met with Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed on Thursday and called for greater cooperation with Africa’s fastest-growing economy, including in infrastructure, green industries, and the digital economy.

China’s foreign ministry said Mr Wang, who is on an annual New Year tour of Africa, stated that China was willing to better align its development strategies with Ethiopia to promote their “all-weather strategic partnership” to new heights.

Mr Wang met Mr Abiy in Addis Ababa during the first stop of his six-day visit to Africa.

He called for accelerating the upgrading of trade and economic cooperation and advancing “high-quality Belt and Road cooperation between China and Africa”, according to the official state news agency Xinhua.

Beijing aims to highlight countries it views as model partners of President Xi Jinping’s flagship Belt and Road infrastructure programme and to expand markets, particularly in young, increasingly affluent economies such as Ethiopia, where the IMF forecasts growth of 7.2 per cent this year.

Mr Wang said he hoped Ethiopia would provide a “sound environment for Chinese enterprises to invest and conduct business”, and said China looked to Ethiopia as playing “an important role in regional and international affairs”.

Both sides agreed to deepen cooperation in traditional areas such as trade, infrastructure, energy, transportation and law, as well as in new areas such as e-commerce, artificial intelligence, and green energy, Xinhua said.

“They also agreed to expand cooperation in culture, tourism, media, education, and think tanks,” it added.

Mr Wang will also travel to Somalia, Tanzania and Lesotho during his trip, which runs until January 12.

(Reuters/NAN)