Key reasons to read this article:
- The U.S. is moving from aid to investment, a shift that could reshape decades of diplomatic practice.
- Washington’s new strategy seems to be influenced by China’s economic footprint across the continent.
- Trade deals, military ties and infrastructure projects are becoming the new battlegrounds for global influence in Africa.
- The continent faces a US$100 billion annual infrastructure gap and whoever helps to close it could forge Africa’s economic future.
The United States is reforming its engagement with Africa, pivoting from decades of aid-led diplomacy toward a model that is centered on trade, infrastructure, and private investment, as global competition for influence on the continent intensifies.
That shift was underscored on 28 January in Addis Ababa, when US Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau signed an agreement with African Union Commission Chair Mahmoud Ali Youssouf to establish a Strategic Infrastructure and Investment Working Group. This initiative aims to mobilize US private capital for large-scale African projects in transport corridors, energy systems, digital infrastructure, and strategic supply chains.
Three days later, Washington signaled a parallel diplomatic reset in the Sahel by dispatching Senior Bureau Official Nick Checker to Mali to engage the country’s military leadership and consult with neighboring Burkina Faso and Niger on economic and security concerns.
These January moves formalized a policy direction that was first outlined in May last year in the Ivory Coast, where Troy Fitrell, the State Department’s Senior Official for African Affairs, launched a new commercial diplomacy strategy that prioritized investment deals over traditional aid metrics.
“We have for decades been defined by an assistance-led paradigm,” Fitrell explained. “We are very directly and very intentionally shifting that toward an investment-led strategy, because that is what actually drives growth.”
Why now? The strategic rationale
US officials frame the pivot as a response to three interlocking pressures – commercial marginalization, intensifying geopolitical rivalry, and vulnerability in critical supply chains.
Commercial marginalization. Africa’s population is expected to reach 2.5 billion by 2050, with purchasing power predicted to exceed US$16 trillion. Yet, US trade with the continent remains modest. In 2024, exports from the United States to Africa accounted for about 1.3% of its overall goods trade that totaled US$72.0 billion, including US$32.4 billion in exports and US$39.6 billion in imports.
“Africa should be among the largest US trading partners,” Fitrell commented, warning that years of limited engagement had created space for rivals to deepen both economic and political ties.
The contrast with China is stark. From 2003 to 2023, the number of African countries citing China as their top trading partner rose from 18 to 52. China-Africa trade reached US$295 billion in 2024, with exports to Africa of about US$178.8 billion and imports of US$116.8 billion.
In comparison, the recently extended African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) supported just US$8 billion in preferential US-Africa trade.
Geopolitical competition. The shift also reflects Washington’s reassessment of how influence is built in Africa. Between 2002 and 2021, China invested an estimated US$339bn across the continent, largely through loans to finance railways, ports, power plants, and industrial zones, projects often associated with long-term political and economic influence. Over the same period, the US provided about US$216bn, with 90% being in grants that focused heavily on health and humanitarian programs.
That disparity was acknowledged in the America First Global Health Strategy, which stated that US assistance should serve broader strategic goals and explicitly framed it as “a counterweight to China”. The document noted the limitations of grant-heavy models compared with asset-focused investment approaches. The Strategy was also framed as a commercial diplomacy tool which, so far, nine African countries have signed with more than a dozen other African countries having signed bilateral health agreements with the United States under the strategy.
The US recalibration has also been shaped by security concerns, particularly in the Sahel, where Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger have expelled Western forces and deepened ties with Moscow, according to the Royal United Services Institute.
According to the Council on Foreign Relations, Russia now maintains security relationships with almost a dozen African countries, frequently exchanging military support for access to natural resources. In testimony before Congress in 2023, Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Molly Phee raised concerns about Russia’s growing influence in the Sahel.
Critical minerals and supply chains. Another driver is America’s growing dependence on imported critical minerals that are essential for clean energy technologies, advanced manufacturing, and defense systems. Federal data shows that the US relies entirely on imports for at least 12 critical minerals and sources over half of another 29 from abroad. Africa holds an estimated 30% of global proven mineral reserves, according to the World Bank.
Despite this, US sourcing from the continent remains limited. China, by contrast, imports the majority of Africa’s cobalt and manganese and dominates global refining capacity, processing up to 90% of rare earth elements worldwide.
While America First Health Strategy documents stop short of defining an Africa-specific minerals policy, they explicitly recognise the continent as being home to some of the world’s largest deposits of minerals and rare earth elements that are vital to advanced military and commercial technology. That assessment has increasingly influenced policy, with US officials recasting trade and investment in Africa as being essential to securing resilient supply chains.
What Africa wants
The Strategic Infrastructure and Investment Working Group aligns with African development frameworks, such as Agenda 2063, the Programme for Infrastructure Development in Africa, and the African Continental Free Trade Area.
The African Development Bank estimates Africa needs US$130–US$170 billion annually for infrastructure, with a current financing shortfall of up to US$100 billion. African leaders have long argued that closing this gap, rather than expanding aid flows, will determine growth.
At a US–Africa business summit in Luanda last June, Angolan President João Lourenço urged Washington to “replace the logic of aid with the logic of investment and trade”, calling for predictable and equitable commercial partnerships. African Union officials echoed that sentiment, emphasizing co-creation over donor-recipient dynamics.
The test ahead
Fitrell’s declaration that “trade, not aid, is now truly our policy for Africa” marked a rhetorical break with the past but whether this translates into durable economic ties remains uncertain.
However, analysts comment that the one-year extension to the AGOA offers only a fragile trade reprieve, leaving long-term market access uncertain. A recent survey of African exporters and manufacturers found that higher U.S. tariffs and unpredictable trade policies erode competitiveness and could push them toward alternative markets, further undermining the commercial relationships the U.S. seeks to build.
