BRICS: China could remove customs duties for 53 African countries

In the tumult of global commercial recompositions, Beijing advances its pawns. China announces the total abolition of customs duties on exports from 53 African countries, expanding preferential access to its market. Behind the gesture, a targeted diplomatic offensive while Washington, under the aegis of Donald Trump, reactivates the protectionist levers against the continent. Africa, long peripheral in geoeconomic arbitrations, becomes the epicenter of a confrontation of influences in which industrial ambitions, strategic alliances and stories of sovereignty intersect.

Beijing lifts barriers: a historical change in Sino-African relations

After the global shock caused by Trump's customs tariffs, China has formalized, after the ministerial meeting of coordination of the forum on Sino-African cooperation (FOCAC), its intention to suppress all customs duties on imports from the 53 African countries with which it maintains diplomatic relations.

This decision constitutes a notable extension of a previous agreement concluded in 2024, which concerned only the African countries classified as “The least advanced”. The new measure will now include major business partners of the continent such as Nigeria and South Africa, hitherto excluded from these customs benefits.

In a joint declaration, the ministers condemned the policies of certain states aimed at “Disturbing the global economic and commercial order” through “The unilateral taxation of customs duties”. Although Beijing did not specify the date of entry into force of this decisionits announcement effect is already significant on the geoeconomic scene.

Several key elements emerge from this announcement, and illustrate its magnitude and its immediate implications for the African continent:

• Africa exports to China for around $ 170 billion a year, mainly raw materials such as copper, cobalt or bauxite;

• This decision will now include intermediate savings not covered by the 2024 agreement, such as Nigeria, South Africa or Ghana;

• Eswatini remains excluded, because of its diplomatic recognition as Taiwan, which China considers a secessionist province;

• This announcement comes as the United States, under Donald Trump, threaten to drastically increase customs duties on African exports: 50 % for Lesotho, 30 % for South Africa, 14 % for Nigeria;

• The United States has temporarily suspended the application of these tariff increases, but the climate of uncertainty remains palpable for African exporters.

In this context, China presents itself as an alternative partner, offering market access without pricing barriers and playing more and more a central role in the commercial architecture of the Global South.

A disguised economic influence strategy?

Beyond the tariff lifting itself, the chronology and the geopolitical context underline a desire of China, an important member of the Alliance of the BRICS, to reconfigure the balance of international economic relations, especially against the United States.

China and its African partners call for the United States to resolve its commercial disputes in a spirit of “Respect and mutual benefits”. In parallel, this tariff opening allows China to strengthen its economic ties with countries producing critical resources such as the DRC or Guinea, while sending a clear signal to the rest of the world.

In this context, this initiative could promote increased use of the Yuan in the Sino-African bilateral regulations, especially in digital form. The development of the digital yuan, already experienced in several pilot regions in China, could find a conducive land on the African continent, where conventional financial infrastructures are often absent, but where the adoption of mobile money is strong.

By extension, some economists question the future emergence of stablecoins backed by African resources, a still marginal subject, but closely monitored in Crypto and Fintech circles.

Beyond the immediate advantages for African economies, this Chinese strategy could redraw global exchange circuits in favor of a more integrated commercial block between China and its African partners, to the detriment of the West, despite the suspension of customs tariffs for 90 days. If this dynamic opens up new perspectives for the continent, it challenges a possible long -term dependence, both commercial and technological. For Africa, the challenge will now be to take advantage of this opening without giving in to the risks of structural asymmetry.