Personal focus on trade relations

Dutch filmmaker presents a friendly frame of Africans happy doing business in China

Mutual understanding and acceptance is flourishing at the grassroots level between Chinese and African traders, says Dutch photographer and filmmaker Pieter van der Houwen.

Van der Houwen, who directed the documentary film The Africa China Connection, says he is fascinated by the vibrant interactions between Chinese and Africans in the South China export hub Guangzhou, and wants to show this phenomenon in his film.

"The Nigerian and Congolese neighborhoods in Guangzhou are very dynamic - the nightclubs, the restaurants - I found it a fascinating phenomenon," he says.

The 50-minute film, first shown last year in the Netherlands, was screened this month at the South London Gallery as a part of the gallery's South by South film program, curated by Joseph Adesunloye, a Nigerian-born filmmaker.

The Africa China Connection traces the lives of several African migrants in Guangzhou, working in small businesses such as clothing and wigs, who have in their small way contributed to significant manufacturing trade flows between China and Africa.

Each has a strong character, and together they demonstrate different kinds of integration with the local Chinese community.

One has married a local Chinese woman and started a family. Another man is trying to save up to bring his wife to China to live with him. Meanwhile, an African woman says she must return to Africa one day because she can never marry a Chinese man.

The film also depicts friendship between individuals. One young Chinese shows his African friend his street dance and violin skills. In another scene, a young Chinese man is having a drink with his African friend in a pub.

Traveling to Guangzhou for the first time in 2010, Van der Houwen spent about 10 weeks over five trips observing and engaging with the city's African traders. He originally planned to document the stories through photography, but later added a documentary film.

Van der Houwen says he managed to build up a good relationship with his interviewees over time so they trusted him with their life stories.

It also helped that Van der Houwen had published a book a decade ago on African sport, which featured photographs of famous African football players, whom his interviewees in China could easily identify with.

"I have the book with me," he says. "It is like a passport. When I go around, I just show people the book. In this profession, it's always about trust and being yourself."

Van der Houwen says he wants to show the equal relationship between Africans and Chinese because this is a story missing from Western media.

He believes this equality is due to China's and Africa's lack of a colonial past. In Europe, Africa is still often seen through a colonial-time lens.

"I find aid development patronizing because it assumes Africa is the perpetual victim," he says. "I looked at the African diaspora and they are looking after themselves. We tend to occupy the moral high ground because we are sending money to them."

He claims the other reason the Western media poorly portrays Africans is lazy journalism, which he admits is a slippery path even he is not able to completely avoid.

"We are calling it Africa, but we don't portray its incredible diversity," he says.

In contrast, he says the Chinese traders he met in Guangzhou have compiled a big, thick book about African countries, describing which ones make for a good investment, and which do not. He says he found this business relationship interesting because it is an equal and balanced one.

"I thought, we never wrote about any African country in such a down-to-earth factual way. The Europeans either mystify Africa as wild Africa and marginalize the human beings, or they depict Africa as catastrophic."

Van der Houwen first went to Africa in the 1980s when he was still a student. He was selected by the Dutch government to do a case study of five small companies that had invested in the continent.

He believes the way most Europeans view Africa has changed little since then, and that he has witnessed China offering an alternative.

He says the fact Africa now has many African-Chinese joint-venture projects demonstrates this "more adult relationship", whereas few European companies would set up in partnership with a local African business.

Another business opportunity China has captured is the increasing manufacturing of products that suit Africa's needs, such as auto parts, mobile phones, fashion items and tractors.

"It happened around 2006 and 2007. Before that, products Africans bought were what the Europeans didn't want. But Chinese manufacturers said we're going to take it seriously, so they customized products to suit African needs."

Such examples include special window frames and roof tiles that would last under heat, solar panels suitable to Africa's environment and devices to heat water, he says.

In The Africa China Connection, Van der Houwen also interviewed Johannesburg academic Achille Mbembe, and Ian Goldin, director of the Oxford Martin School at the University of Oxford, to analyze the migration of Africans to China.

Both highlight the speed that China grants foreigners working visas as a key contributor to the growing number of Africans working in China, unlike places with more visa restrictions, such as Europe. They also acknowledged the importance of money sent back by migrants in contributing to the African economy.

Money sent home by Africans working worldwide was valued at $51.8 billion in 2010, compared with $43 billion in Official Development Aid, according to figures from the World Bank.

Van der Houwen concludes that allowing more African migrants into Europe would therefore be a better way of helping Africa than simply giving Africa aid, and says this is a key message of his film. He hopes the Chinese government will continue to open its doors to Africans.

He admits that some Chinese are racist toward Africans, but it is open and identifiable racism. He says some of the Africans he interviewed said they find Chinese racism easier to deal with because it is honest, whereas they find it difficult to cope with the more covert racism shown by Europeans.

"They say, 'We continue to have this feeling, and are paranoid because we don't know if (the Europeans) are racist or not'."

However, the trade relationship between Chinese and Africans is not hindered by racism, he adds, because both parties care very much about making money.

He has also noticed many Africans relate to China more because they can still see poverty that resembles their situations at home. They also find China's rapid growth very inspiring, believing they can do the same.

A Congolese man once told him, "When I went to Paris, I feel intimidated, because we'll never look like Paris. But it could look like Guangzhou." Gallery film program organizer Adesunloye tells a similar story of Africa's easy identification with China.

"When you ask the Europeans how they built something, they may say the Romans built it. But in China, you see new constructions from scratch all the time, and when you ask them who built it, they'll point over there and say, 'It's built by that man'."

cecilyliu@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily Africa Weekly 11/29/2013 page29)