Paper short abstract:

This article aims to revisit the literature on China's oil ties with Africa through the technological lenses and looking at a diverse quality of African oil (sulphur content and API gravity). The goal is to see how much of China's oil policy in the region is a result of refining economics.

Paper long abstract:

China's oil ties with African countries have garnered a great deal of attention from scholars and practitioners. There has been a wealth of knowledge produced regarding China's oil policy in the region, its rationales and achievements. According to one popular narrative, China has been trying to lock in access to oil, taking advantage of weak African states, striking outlandishly favourable deals and often pursuing a resource grabbing policy in the region. There has been a very limited effort, however, to trace and explain China's inroads into Africa using technological lenses and refining economics, which gives drastically less room for political fiction and speculations. What role China's own refining capacity has played in the China's ongoing energy quest in Africa? How a huge diversity in the quality of African oil, namely sulphur content and API gravity - from heavy Ugandan oil to famous sweet and light Nigerian Bonny Light - has informed China's oil policy? Answering these questions can shed more light on the way China has been navigating the African oil industry. This article aims to revisit the literature on China's oil ties with Africa through the technological lenses, to see how much of China's oil policy in the region is a result of refining economics.