Countries should work for common development

In Morocco, we have a popular story of a farmer asking a passerby to climb a fig tree to pick some figs to eat. Once the passerby is up the tree, the farmer gets angry and yells, "Get down, who asked you to do that?"

Western countries feel no discomfort in adopting a similar attitude.

Having lived, studied and worked in China for more than 20 years, I've been deeply impressed by China's poverty alleviation efforts. In December 2020, the Communist Party of China declared that it had achieved its goal of eliminating extreme poverty by the 100th anniversary of its founding. This is a remarkable achievement that has earned it the respect from most of the international community, with the notable exception of some Western countries.

China lifting 770 million rural people out of poverty since its reform and opening-up in 1978, accounting for more than 70 percent of the global impoverished population, was met with scorn from the United States and its allies.

But that isn't surprising. Belittling China's achievements and hyping up the "China threat" theory have become the new norm for these countries.

Since it was first proposed in 2013, the Belt and Road Initiative has made great contributions to global economic development based on the principles of equality, mutual benefit and win-win cooperation. Yet China has been accused of using it to "lay debt traps".

At the opening of the 76th session of the United Nations General Assembly in September 2021, President Xi Jinping proposed the Global Development Initiative. This initiative is aimed at helping developing countries achieve the Sustainable Development Goals of the United Nations' 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

The Global Development Initiative also highlights that for developing countries it should not be a case of either the East or the West but both, as it calls for all countries to work together for common development.

Yet, according to the US and its allies, when China promotes trade, investment and foreign assistance with a developing country without imposing any political conditions, it is a hindrance to the development process of the recipient countries. That is because it exposes the strings attached to the West's "democracy and freedom "engagement with developing countries, which is aimed at making them vassal states.

Over the past two decades, China has strengthened its partnerships with international organizations, such as the United Nations Development Programme and the World Bank. This multilateral international development strategy shift should have provoked a positive response from the West, and even encouraged the developed countries to join their efforts with China to address immediate environmental challenges, help to resolve regional conflicts or limit the socioeconomic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. On the contrary, their reaction has been the complete opposite.

After witnessing China's active engagement in multilateral organizations, some hard-line Western conservative think tanks raised the alarm that China's growing influence over the developing world would consolidate Beijing's global governance approach.

This approach focuses on creating favorable conditions for sustainable economic growth without the imposition of political conditions and interference in internal affairs, the two maintainers of the US-led West's self-serving global governance structure.

The good news for people in the developing countries is that the US and its G7 partners have started to propose their own alternatives to fund infrastructure projects in developing countries, such as the Partnership for Global Infrastructure and Investment, after witnessing the overwhelming success of China's initiatives.

We need to admit that this is a very significant shift in the Western policy toward developing countries.

Furthermore, we hope that this will ultimately lead to moves to establish partnership with China and other emerging countries with the aim of making the world a better place for all its inhabitants.

In an article titled "Analysis of perspectives on the energy orientation of Chinese aid to Africa", Zhang Haibing of the Shanghai Institute for International Studies offers a meaningful assessment of China's assistance and cooperation mechanisms in Africa, which can help the G7 countries to better understand the underlying objectives of China's foreign policy.

"Chinese assistance will serve to promote development; development will serve to promote better cooperation; and better cooperation will ultimately achieve common development for China and its African partners," Zhang wrote.

The essential objective of Chinese assistance is therefore to participate in establishing stability and prosperity in Africa, in order to then be able to better collaborate in various fields with stable partners and thus achieve considerable gains for all parties.

This was what our Chinese friends have offered us, and this is exactly what we are expecting from our partners in the West as a contribution to the rebirth of our continent.

The author is president of the Africa-China Cooperation Association for Development.