Africa can benefit from China's anti-poverty experience, says UN official

UNITED NATIONS, April 1 (Xinhua) -- Africa could learn from China's poverty-eradication experience so as to lift more Africans out of poverty and usher in a brighter future, a United Nations official has said.

"Africa must evolve its own models" due to its "very specific situation," Ahunna Eziakonwa, assistant secretary-general and director of the Regional Bureau for Africa of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), told Xinhua in a recent interview.

The agency signed Monday a Memorandum of Understanding for its partnership with the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), which aims to promote trade as a stimulus for Africa's socioeconomic recovery from the COVID-19 crisis, and as a driver of sustainable development particularly for women and youths in the Decade of Action for the Sustainable Development Goals.

"Africa must learn from its own experience and develop models based on its particular context," said Eziakonwa.

She stressed the importance of trade in the growth of the continent and called for a revamp of its existing infrastructure system so as to facilitate trade within the continent and with the rest of the world.

Prosperous trade won't happen in Africa "unless we take industry and industrialization seriously," said Eziakonwa, stressing that China can support in this regard to help "Africa's production levels to rise."

Talking about what role China could play in the AfCFTA, Eziakonwa said that Africa can benefit a lot from what China had done in reducing poverty.

Applauding the fact that China has pulled 700 million people out of poverty, she said Africa needs to lift many people out of poverty today as well.

She underscored the importance to learn from China as "one of the biggest urgent needs for the continent is to eradicate poverty."

"Our goal is to end poverty and to promote prosperity for the African people," she said.