The mutual benefits from Sino-Africa trade: Evidence on emission transfer along the global supply chain

The carbon-emission transfer between two representative developing economies - China and Africa - behind the international trade has aroused quite a few controversies, which have not been fully estimated and understood yet. In this paper, the Multiregional Input-Output (MRIO) method is applied to the participants of Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) from the global perspective to reveal the roles both China and Africa have played in the global supply chain as either the original emitter or the final consumer, and to depict the evolution pattern of carbon transfer via Sino-Africa trade from the year 2000–2015. The findings are as follows: 1) China has played the role of net exporter of embodied carbon-emission in Sino-Africa trade, for the amount of emitted carbon China had born yet resulted by consumption in Africa well surpassed that vice versa. 2) Compared to the carbon-emission flows embodied in EU-Africa and US-Africa trades, China has shouldered more carbon-emission derived from Africa's consumption. 3) The sectoral contribution and intensities of embodied carbon-emission correspond to the trading pattern between China and Africa, which stems from the two parties' comparative advantages and economic complementarity. 4) The intensities of embodied carbon-emission on both sides are declining towards a rosy prospect, which indicates an improving carbon-emission efficiency of both economies. From a global perspective, both China and Africa play a positive part in carbon-emission reduction. The results in this study can facilitate low-carbon and high-efficiency trading link between the two economies.