Africa's Silk Road: China and India's New Economic Frontier.

• Author: Murphey, Ana Carolina Cabral
• Position: Book review

AFRICA'S SILK ROAD: CHINA AND INDIA'S NEW ECONOMIC FRONTIER

Harry G. Broadman

(Washington, DC: World Bank Publications, 2007), 391 pages.

Harry Broadman's book, Africa's Silk Road, covers the increase in trade and investments from China and India in Africa by analyzing the multiple levels of integration between these two economies and the African continent. Broadman argues that the fundamental differences in resource, labor and capital endowments of Africa and Asia make the two countries complementary business partners for Africa.

Over the past seventeen years, fifteen African economies have accounted for 34 percent of the continent's population while obtaining GDP growth of 4.5 percent or more on an average annual basis. Broadman persuasively describes how African economies will continue to require more investment, new technologies and IT services in order to sustain economic growth. Exports from Africa to Asia rose from $7 billion in 1995 to over $40 billion in 2004, while African imports from Asia nearly doubled since 2002, surpassing $35 billion in 2004.

Broadman's book presents a complete analysis of the challenges "at the...