2016 China-Africa Year in Review

A China in Africa Podcast

By Eric Olander & Cobus van Staden on January 10, 2017

After years of relatively trouble-free development, 2016 marked a turning point in the China-Africa relationship, amid turbulent changes in the global economic and political order. China increased its deployment of combat troops to the continent, suffering some its first casualties in South Sudan and Mali, while trade between the two regions decreased for the first time in years. Meanwhile, China dangled promises to finally outlaw ivory as Africa’s elephants suffered another brutal year at the hands of poachers.

Can Beijing’s Ivory Ban Save the Elephants?

A ChinaFile Conversation

By Eric Olander, Peter J. Li & more on January 10, 2017

On New Year’s Eve, Beijing announced it will ban the ivory trade in China, potentially shutting down the world’s biggest ivory market. Why did Beijing decide to curb the ivory trade? Will it put enough muscle behind it to enforce the decision? What impact will the ban have on elephant poaching?

Chen Dingding

on January 10, 2017

Chen Dingding is an International Relations professor at Jinan University, a nonresident fellow at the Global Public Policy Institute in Berlin, Germany, and Founding Director of the Intellisia Institute.