By Akwe Amosu

Foreign Policy In Focus

Deep inside the tropical forest of Gabon, 500 miles from the coast, China is going where no other investors dare. A Chinese consortium, led by the China National Machinery and Equipment Import and Export Corporation, has won the contract to develop Gabon’s massive Belinga iron ore deposit. In return for purchasing the entire output, Chinese operators will build not only the extractive infrastructure at Belinga but a hydro-electric dam to power it, a railway to the coast, and a deepwater port north of the capital, Libreville, for exporting the ore.

This venture will cost several billion dollars, and China will have to wait three years before any ore is actually extracted. Since the site was identified in 1955, no Western investors had stepped forward to develop it. But with the support of its entire state machine, Chinese companies are now taking the risk.

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Posted by pichu at March 9, 2007 4:47 PM