On November 8, 2009, Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi delivered a report at the Fourth Ministerial Conference of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC), introducing the implementation of the FOCAC Beijing Summit follow-up actions and reviewing comprehensively the achievements of FOCAC over the past 3 years.

Three years ago, the Beijing Summit announced the building of a new type of China-Africa strategic partnership featuring political equality and mutual trust, economic win-win cooperation and cultural exchanges, which has become a landmark in the history of China-Africa relations, Yang said in his report. Over the past 3 years, the follow-up actions of the Beijing Summit have been implemented steadily with the joint efforts of both sides. In particular, the eight measures of pragmatic cooperation with Africa declared by President Hu Jintao at the Beijing Summit have been implemented comprehensively. China and Africa now enjoy deeper mutual political trust, more productive trade and economic cooperation and closer personnel exchanges at all levels.

He noted that the implementation of the Beijing Summit follow-up actions mainly achieved the following results:

First, China-Africa political exchanges and cooperation are strengthened. China and Africa maintain frequent high-level exchanges and have consolidated political mutual trust. Chinese leaders altogether have visited 36 African countries while 36 African leaders have visited China. Chinese and African leaders also meet each other on such multilateral occasions as the United Nations.

China and Africa keep close diplomatic consultations and dialogue. China has built the foreign ministry's political consultation or strategic dialogue mechanism with 28 African countries. The Chinese foreign minister has visited 16 African countries, and the foreign ministers of 15 African countries have visited China.

China and Africa support and collaborate with each other in international affairs and are committed to maintaining the legitimate rights and interests of developing countries. China supports Africa's integration efforts and has held two strategic dialogues with the African Union (AU) Commission. China also supports the New Partnership for Africa's Development. The Chinese government has appointed its special representative on African affairs to actively participate in the mediation and settlement of hotspot issues in Africa.

Over the past three years, China has dispatched an accumulative total of 6,281 person times of peacekeeping troops and policemen to Africa. At present, there are 1,629 Chinese officers, soldiers and policemen implementing peacekeeping operations in 6 mission areas of the United Nations in Africa. China has sent 4 groups of naval ships to the Gulf of Aden and Somali waters for escort operations since the beginning of this year.

Second, practical cooperation in economy and trade between China and Africa is fruitful. The Chinese government has actively fulfilled its commitments made at the Beijing Summit and China-Africa economic and trade cooperation moves forward stably. China has increased assistance to Africa considerably, especially relieved the debts of Africa's least developed countries and heavily indebted poor countries. China has provided concessional loans for Africa's infrastructure construction projects and further opened its market to the products from Africa's least developed countries. China is implementing the agricultural technology demonstration center project as scheduled.

China-Africa trade volume in 2008 exceeded US$100 billion. The two sides maintain the growth momentum of investment and financial cooperation.

Third, China-Africa cooperation on cultural and social development enjoys robust growth. The bilateral cultural exchanges grow frequently and China has signed cultural cooperation agreement with all the African countries with which it has diplomatic relations. The 2008 Focus on African Culture and the 2009 Focus on Chinese Culture activities have been held successfully in China and Africa respectively.

China and Africa are expanding joint efforts of education and human resources development. China increased the quota of government scholarships for Africans to 4,000 person times in 2009. At the same time, the China-Africa human resources training program and the project of rural school construction with Chinese assistance have advanced smoothly. China has cooperated with 16 African countries in opening 23 Confucius Institutes and Confucius Classrooms.

China actively supports Africa's efforts of improving people's livelihood. Since the Beijing Summit, it has dispatched 1,200 person times of medical staffs to and provided RMB50 million worth medical equipments for 42 African countries. A total of 30 Malaria Prevention and Treatment Centers have all been opened in African countries.

Youth, women and friendly cities of China and Africa enjoy close exchanges. The All-China Women's Federation established women's training and exchange centers in 5 African countries and has offered 28 batches of material assistance to the women's organizations of 14 African countries. 500 African youth have visited China. So far, there have been 98 pairs of friendly provinces and cities between China and Africa.

Fourth, FOCAC has strengthened its institutional construction. Since FOCAC was initiated in 2000, mechanisms including the regular ministerial conference, senior officials' meeting and consultations between the Chinese Follow-up Committee of FOCAC and the African diplomatic corps in China have been established and the regular political dialogue mechanism at the foreign ministers' level has been built.

Yang also briefly introduced the two draft outcome documents, i.e. the FOCAC Sharm el-Sheikh Declaration and the FOCAC - Sharm el-Sheikh Action Plan for 2010-2012 to be adopted at the Fourth Ministerial Conference and submitted the drafts to the Conference for consideration.

The Fourth Ministerial Conference of FOCAC was held in the Egyptian coastal city of Sharm el-Sheikh from November 8 to 9, 2009 to review the implementation of Beijing Summit follow-up actions and plan for the next 3 years of cooperation between China and Africa.