JIIA Forum Presentation (Summary)August 10, 2010
Venue: Japan Institute of International Affairs

MATSUYAMA Ryoichi
Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary
to the Republic of Botswana
Representative of the Government of Japanto the Southern Africa Development Community (SADC)“Recent Developments in Africa and Japan’s African
Diplomacy”<Opening remarks>
What is the “truth” about Africa, whose image for many people is a composite ofinterminable political disorder, large numbers of refugees, and intractable poverty?

Myown view is that the 53 countries of Africa, covering a total land area of 30 million square
kilometers and stretching 7400km north to south, can be classified into three regions.
First, there are the countries of North Africa, or the Maghreb, possessing a wealth ofpetroleum resources and constituting a single economic zone with the Middle East and theMediterranean.

Second, there are the countries of southern Africa, some of which are now

in the position to aspire to self-sustained growth through trade and investment without muchassistance. Third, there are the Sub-Saharan countries lying near the equator, which on
the whole must be said to be in bad shape.

Sub-Saharan countries account for 33 of the49 countries termed least developed countries (LDC) and more than 70% of the individuals
affected or killed by infectious diseases (AIDS and malaria) are from this region. These
harsh facts provide some justification for the bleak image mentioned earlier.
On the other hand, Sub-Saharan Africa has achieved a high rate of growth averaging 5% orso since 2000, steadily forming a picture of Africa different from the “traditional” image.
While in part attributable to fortunate turns of circumstance such as clear reduction in theareas suffering conflict and political instability (relative calm has been restored to most areas
other than Sudan, Somalia, Zimbabwe, and Madagascar) and a decline in the number ofrefugees from a peak of nearly 7 million down to about 2 million as peace processes move
forward, this also reflects a rise in income due to the surge in prices of the region’s principal
commodities of agricultural produce and mineral resources. In one sense, this points to
Africa’s inherent vulnerability to natural resource availability and drops in international prices.
This said, however, Africa on the whole is on a path to growth, despite the impact of theglobal economic slowdown, and can be regarded as having reached the stage at whichsustained development built on expanded intra-regional trade and investment becomes apractical consideration.

This, too, is an incontrovertible aspect of contemporary Africa.
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Reflecting these circumstances, international interest continues to grow in Africa, “forgotten”
for quite some time after the end of the Cold War.

The Tokyo International Conference on

African Development (TICAD), established in 1993 on Japan’s initiative, marked thebeginning of this interest, and the agreement on doubling aid to Africa reached at the G8Glen Eagles Conference in July 2005 was of great significance.

Although the Millennium

Development Goals (MDGs) presented at the UN Millennium Summit (September 2000) are
far from being met, new approaches that embrace both self-help efforts (ownership) by
African countries and cooperation (partnership) by the international community continue toproduce steady results. Ranking fifth among DAC countries for its ODA, Japan, too, isparticipating in this process.
Turning our attention to the donor countries, what characteristics do we find among them?
While this might be oversimplifying matters a bit, I would say that recent years have seen
the rise of efforts aimed at securing resource concessions as well as the expanding
presence of emerging nations coupled with competitive relations with Western countries.
There have been conspicuous moves made by Russia, which is working to reverse thesubstantial decline in its influence since the collapse of the Soviet Union and to securenatural resources (particularly uranium), and China, which is seeking to acquire a greater‘”constituency” in international organizations and to gain a secure hold on various resources(petroleum, copper, nickel) essential to its own economic growth, giving rise to a sense ofcaution among other donor countries.

In the latter case, it is difficult to deny that China’svigorous African diplomacy has sparked interest and involvement in Africa by theinternational community and that assertive investment development is contributing toAfrica’s economy, but actions that are dismissive of international rules and thecircumstances of partner countries (lack of consideration for compliance, governance andtransparency,

approaches

whereby

China

providesinfrastructureandlaboracross-the-board in exchange for obtaining natural resources, etc.) cannot help but cause
friction with other countries.

Japan should urge China to take steps to correct this at thegovernment level.
In comparison to this impressive “boom” of activity by China, Japan’s African diplomacy at aglance – the number of embassies established, the scale of summit-level diplomacy, thenumber of Japanese nationals resident in those countries, etc. – cannot help but appear
very subdued.

However, a closer look reveals that Japan’s stance is characterized byconsistency and a long-term perspective.

For example, Japan suggested doubling ODA

and private investment in Africa by 2012 at the 4th TICAD (held every five years) in May
2008, and an action plan was adopted that included this proposal as well as infrastructure
improvement, agriculture, trade and investment, community development, education,
medical care and climate change measures.

In the annual follow-up meetings that

supplement this Conference, Japan has frequently declared that these guidelines will not beswayed by changes in its domestic political environment.

Japan has also been conducting

more substantial African diplomacy, such as ascertaining the wishes of African countries andreflecting these in discussions conducted at the G8 (L’Aquila, August 2009) and G20
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(London, April 2009) meetings, earning the appreciation of participating African countries.
However, the lack on interest within Japan vis-à-vis these efforts is a problem, and I would
like to see the public better informed not only that diplomacy towards Africa contributes tothe stability of the international community as a whole but also that these efforts strengthen
Japan’s diplomatic infrastructure and generate two-way economic benefits.
If I were to draw conclusions from the above, I would say that Africa possesses bothpotential (plentiful resources and market values) and vulnerabilities (the dangers of conflict,infectious diseases, low educational levels, instability over generational changes inleadership), and that it is headed for an important turning point in realizing stable growth.
Collaborative efforts are needed to provide an efficient “push” forward and, though in aseemingly circuitous manner, these will ultimately come back around to Japan’s benefit.
<Separate explanations>(Botswana)― Although a small country with a population of only about two million, Botswana has beentermed “a model student of good governance”; it enjoys stable domestic politicalconditions and has effectively invested the income from its key commodity diamonds into
infrastructure and education.

The country also has plentiful livestock and tourism

resources and, as evidenced by the choice of Botswana’s capital Gaborone for theheadquarters of the 15-member Southern African Development Community (SADC), it
continues to build a foothold as a regional hub.
(Development strategy being pursued by Botswana and SADC)― Given the high level of education and the ready availability of human resources on theone hand and the small size of its population on the other, Botswana has put together anational strategy of forming a financial and logistics center by completing a customs union
within SADC and expanding its infrastructure (airport, transportation, communication
facilities).

As awareness of the political and economic benefits through regional

integration grows among national leaders – albeit very slowly – moves toward integration
within SADC are likely to pick up speed.
(Vision of an African development and growth model for the future)― In addition to the sale of natural resources, attempts are being pursued to foster
investment, trade and knowledge-intensive industries (especially in southern Africa).
Such business models will generate benefits for both Japan and Africa as middle-waredevelopment and added-value creation utilizing the advantages of Japan-standard
terrestrial digital television broadcasting (affinity with portable devices, few restrictions dueto royalties).
(Issues in Japan’s African diplomacy)― Bearing in mind the blunt resource diplomacy being conducted by China, Russia andothers, the issues facing Japan’s ODA center on enhancing ODA’s “visibility” by
substantially shortening the time between planning and implementation and converting tolarger-scale/grants projects that enable technology transfer and human resources
development.

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