Abstract
This chapter discusses the historical shifts and underlying drivers behind the rise of twenty-first-century Chinese-African hydropower development. It locates the basis of these shifts in changes in financing regimes for hydropower projects in Africa; host country governments have pivoted away from dwindling traditional OECD and multilateral development sources of finance and towards new alternative sources of Chinese state-owned commercial lending. The varied hydro-historical trajectories of Uganda, Ghana, and Ethiopia are compared here through an analysis of select project cases in order to demonstrate how and why different contexts have converged on similar outcomes in pivoting to Chinese partnership arrangements. The three cases, respectively, represent private sector, multilateral, and state-led approaches to African dam development which have each ended up resorting to coordinated bilateral Chinese financing mechanisms to provide solutions to rising energy demand and domestic resource constraints. This chapter concludes with common risks and challenges faced by African cases in various contexts.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Notes
- 1.
Interview with African country government hydro-official in April 2019.
- 2.
The filling of the domestic savings gap in developing countries with external assistance to generate a capital to output ratio was enshrined in the Harrod-Domar model; for a critical take, see Easterly (1999).
- 3.
- 4.
For more on the differences between multilateral development bank, private bank, and Chinese policy bank lending in the hydro-energy industry, see Plummer Braeckman et al. (2020).
- 5.
For more on modernisation in Africa, see Cooper (1997).
- 6.
For further treatment and discussion, see Miescher and Tsikata (2009) and Tenkorang et al. (forthcoming).
References
Abtew, W., & Dessu, S. B. (2019). Financing the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam. In W. Abtew & S. B. Dessu (Eds.), The Grand Ethopian Renaissance Dam on the Blue Nile (pp. 161–169). New York: Springer.
Asiama, K., Lengoiboni, M., & van Der Molen, P. (2017). In the land of the dammed: Assessing governance in resettlement of Ghana’s Bui Dam project. Land, 6(4), 80.
Awuni, F. (2017, April 10). World Bank urges SADA to revise Pwalugu multi-purpose dam project. CitiFMonline, http://citifmonline.com/2017/04/world-bank-urges-sada-to-revise-pwalugu-multi-purpose-dam-project/. Accessed 1 June 2020.
Barigaba, J. (2018, April 9). Kampala awaits Isimba power project verdict. The EastAfrican. https://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/business/Uganda-awaits-Isimba-power-project-verdict-/2560-4378548-ek4qu5/index.html. Accessed 1 June 2020.
CGTN Africa (2019, February 20). Ethiopia contracts Chinese companies to complete GERD. CGTN Africa. https://africa.cgtn.com/2019/02/20/ethiopia-contracts-chinese-companies-to-complete-gerd-construction/. Accessed 1 June 2020.
Champion, M., & Manek, N. (2019, August 1). Death on the Nile haunts Ethiopia’s rebirth. Bloomberg. https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2019-nile-river-ethiopia-dam/. Accessed 1 June 2020.
Chin, G. T., & Gallagher, K. P. (2019). Coordinated credit spaces: The globalization of Chinese development finance. Development and Change, 50(1), 245–274.
Cooper, F. (1997). Modernizing bureaucrats, backward Africans, and the development concept. In F. Cooper & R. Packard (Eds.), International development and the social sciences (pp. 64–92). Berkeley: University of California Press.
Dreher, A., Fuchs, A., Parks, B. C., Strange, A. M., & Tierney, M. J. (2017). Aid, China, and growth: Evidence from a new global development finance dataset. AidData Working Paper #46. Williamsburg, VA: AidData. https://china.aiddata.org/projects/34940?iframe=y. Accessed 1 June 2020.
Easterly, W. (1999). The ghost of the financing gap: How the Harrod-Domar growth model still haunts development economics. http://elibrary.worldbank.org/doi/abs/10.1596/1813-9450-1807. Accessed 1 June 2020.
Garcia-Herrero, A, & Xu, J. (2019, July 22). China’s investment in Africa: What the data really says, and the implications for Europe. Bruegel. https://www.bruegel.org/2019/07/chinas-investment-in-africa-what-the-data-really-says-and-the-implications-for-europe/. Accessed 1 June 2020.
GCR Staff. (2016, December 2). China lends $4.5bn for Angola’s Kwanza River mega dam. Global Construction Review. http://www.globalconstructionreview.com/news/chinese-lends-45bn-angolas-kwa7nza-rive7r-me7ga/. Accessed 1 June 2020.
GhanaWeb. (2020, February 28). Parliament approves $993 m for Pwalugu Dam project. GhanaWeb. https://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/business/Parliament-approves-993m-for-Pwalugu-Dam-project-879844. Accessed 1 June 2020.
Harvey, D. (1989). The condition of post-modernity: An enquiry into the origins of social change. Oxford: Blackwell.
Hensengerth, O. (2011). Interaction of Chinese institutions with host governments in dam construction: The Bui dam in Ghana. Bonn: German Development Institute.
International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) (1973). Report and recommendation of the President to the Executive Directors on a proposed loan to the Zambia Electricity Supply Corporation Limited with the guarantee of the Republic of Zambia for the Kafue hydro-electric project. http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/392291468170655803/pdf/multi0page.pdf. Accessed 1 June 2020.
Lavers, T., & Boamah, F. (2016). The impact of agricultural investments on state capacity: A comparative analysis of Ethiopia and Ghana. Geoforum, 72, 94–103.
Ma, C., & He, L. (2008). From state monopoly to renewable portfolio: Restructuring China’s electric utility. Energy Policy, 36(5), 1697–1711.
Plummer Braeckman, J., Markkanen, S., Souvannaseng, P. (2020). Mapping the evolving complexity of large hydropower project finance on low and lower-middle income countires. FutureDAMS Working Paper 007. Manchester: University of Manchester.
Mawdsley, E. (2018). “From billions to trillions”: Financing the SDGs in a world “beyond aid”. Dialogues in Human Geography, 8(2), 191–195.
Mawdsley, E., Murray, E. W., Overton, J., Scheyvens, R., & Banks, G. (2018). Exporting stimulus and “shared prosperity”: Reinventing foreign aid for a retroliberal era. Development Policy Review, 36(S1), 25–43.
Miescher, S., & Tsikata, D. (2009). Hydro-power and the promise of modernity and development in Ghana: Comparing the Akosombo and Bui dam projects. Ghana Studies, 12(13), 15–53.
Power Technology. (2016). Isimba hydropower project. https://www.power-technology.com/projects/isimba-hydropower-project/. Accessed 1 June 2020.
Rostek-Buetti, A. (2019, January 17). China’s loan policy under scrutiny. Deutsche Welle. https://www.dw.com/en/chinas-loan-policy-under-scrutiny/a-47118123. Accessed 1 June 2020.
Schäfer, F. T. (2017). Revisiting the agrarian question: Coffee, flowers and Ethiopia’s new capitalists. PhD dissertation. SOAS University of London.
Scott, J. C. (1998). Seeing like a state: How certain schemes to improve the human condition have failed. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Tenkorang, E., Enu-Kwesi, F., Bendu, F. S., & Souvannaseng, P. (Forthcoming). Mapping dam finance projects in Ghana. FutureDAMS Working Paper. Manchester: University of Manchester.
Uganda Electricity Generation Company Limited (UEGCL). (2018). Isimba Dam to get new engineers to solve cracks. https://uegcl.com/corporate-affairs/news/2-isimba-dam-to-get-new-engineers-to-solve-cracks.html. Accessed 1 June 2020.
UN Habitat, et al. (2018). The state of African cities: The geography of African investment. UN Habitat and IHS-Erasmus University Rotterdam. https://unhabitat.org/the-state-of-african-cities-2018-the-geography-of-african-investment. Accessed 1 June 2020.
United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). (2019). UNCTAD world investment report 2019. Geneva: UNCTAD. https://unctad.org/en/PublicationsLibrary/wir2019_en.pdf. Accessed 1 June 2020.
Woldegebrael, E. H. (2018). The materialization of “developmental state” in Ethiopia: Insights from the Gibe III hydroelectric development project regime (p. 35). Omo Valley: L’Espace Politique.
World Bank, & Government of Uganda. (2015). Uganda country economic memorandum: Economic diversification and growth in the era of oil and volatility. Joint Report of the World Bank and the Government of Uganda. http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/797831467989562966/pdf/97146-REVISED-V2-PUBLIC-summaryl.pdf. Accessed 1 June 2020.
Yankson, P. W. K., Asiedu, A. B., Owusu, K., Urban, F., & Siciliano, G. (2018). The livelihood challenges of resettled communities of the Bui dam project in Ghana and the role of Chinese dam-builders. Development Policy Review, 36(S1), 476–494.
Acknowledgement
Funding for parts of this research were provided by the UK Research and Innovation Global Challenges Research Fund and the FutureDAMS research consortia.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2021 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Souvannaseng, P. (2021). Twenty-First-Century Chinese-African Hydropower Projects in Perspective. In: Rousseau, JF., Habich-Sobiegalla, S. (eds) The Political Economy of Hydropower in Southwest China and Beyond. International Political Economy Series. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-59361-2_13
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-59361-2_13
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-59360-5
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-59361-2
eBook Packages: Political Science and International StudiesPolitical Science and International Studies (R0)