Comments on: Economic imperialism in Lusaka http://langabi.name/blog/2009/03/25/economic-imperialism-in-lusaka Paul Cook's blog Fri, 10 Feb 2012 01:01:23 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6.2 By: Jonathan http://langabi.name/blog/2009/03/25/economic-imperialism-in-lusaka#comment-14001 Jonathan Wed, 25 Mar 2009 10:39:57 +0000 http://langabi.name/blog/?p=220#comment-14001 Very interesting perspective. The scramble for Africa continues. I had not thought of China's and South Africa's interests as being complementary, although our government might see it that way, given their refusal to allow the Dalai Lama in. One area we do compete in is construction, with SA firms very frustrated by the uncompetitively low Chinese tenders. And the quality that ensues. We were interested to see in Shanghai that the construction quality there looks quite good (from a superficial and lay perspective). So why is it so poor in Africa? But your question of where that leaves the Zambians is very pertinent. Many of the best of them are elsewhere (including Johannesburg), which is the lot of resource-based economies. How we use the resources we are blessed / cursed with in this continent now will determine the welfare of many generations into the future. See if you can get a sense of how the new president is doing. The previous one seemed to be very good, but unfortunately died in office. Very interesting perspective. The scramble for Africa continues. I had not thought of China’s and South Africa’s interests as being complementary, although our government might see it that way, given their refusal to allow the Dalai Lama in. One area we do compete in is construction, with SA firms very frustrated by the uncompetitively low Chinese tenders. And the quality that ensues. We were interested to see in Shanghai that the construction quality there looks quite good (from a superficial and lay perspective). So why is it so poor in Africa?

But your question of where that leaves the Zambians is very pertinent. Many of the best of them are elsewhere (including Johannesburg), which is the lot of resource-based economies. How we use the resources we are blessed / cursed with in this continent now will determine the welfare of many generations into the future.

See if you can get a sense of how the new president is doing. The previous one seemed to be very good, but unfortunately died in office.

]]> By: Sally http://langabi.name/blog/2009/03/25/economic-imperialism-in-lusaka#comment-13996 Sally Wed, 25 Mar 2009 09:44:07 +0000 http://langabi.name/blog/?p=220#comment-13996 So glad you met up with the rest of the group, and delighted to hear that someone in Zambia has the expertise to fix The Beast's wheel. While it is a pain to have to wander round, with one's luggage, while waiting to be collected, it IS a stunning opportunity to sense the mood of the nation from the lips of the people themselves. Many ideas to occupy your mind as you travel the endless kilometres across African savannah. Hope the savannah does the traditional stuff and shows you some animals. So glad you met up with the rest of the group, and delighted to hear that someone in Zambia has the expertise to fix The Beast’s wheel.

While it is a pain to have to wander round, with one’s luggage, while waiting to be collected, it IS a stunning opportunity to sense the mood of the nation from the lips of the people themselves. Many ideas to occupy your mind as you travel the endless kilometres across African savannah. Hope the savannah does the traditional stuff and shows you some animals.

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