Examining the impact of China-Africa Educational Cooperation :A Case study of Cameroon.

Educational co-operation within the China-Africa Relation has been identified as an important sector on which Africa can leverage to boost its education and skill development that have been some of the bottlenecks of Africa’s development. This cooperation centers on China’s role in Africa’s human resource development through soft power with Africa and promoting skill development for African countries. As such, the paper examined the different dimensions of China-Africa educational cooperation and its impact with a focus on Cameroon, through a review of corresponding literature which include; published and unpublished papers, journal papers, government reports and newspapers articles. The study found that there still exits huge skill gap with no formal evaluations, even though there have been records of skill development schemes as well as increase in pledges made with each successive high level summits. Finally, the study maintains that strong internal policies and pragmatic action on Cameroonian side will enable Cameroon to properly engage China for WIN -WIN cooperation.


Introduction
In recent years, the world has witnessed a strong presence of China in Africa. The for China-African co-operation, which take turns in China and Africa tri-annually.
Education cooperation between china and Africa is theoretically based on mutual support and recognition of the complementarity in pace of development between the two partners. Ketema and Hong (2009) asserted that their cooperation has also been a reflection of the principle of South-South Cooperation in terms of the exchange of resources, technology, and knowledge between developing countries also known as countries of the global South. Which Gillespie (2006) Victoria and Nathan (2017), reported that by 2014, China surpassed the US and UK to become the second most popular destination for African students studying abroad. The influx of foreign students to China in the recent time has been linked to the Belt and Road Initiative, and FOCAC framework on the African side. More so , China have continued to forge its Cooperation with African countries in all areas including--trade, commerce, economic ,political, health, cultural and education (Brautigam 2009;Bjørn, 2011;King, 2010King, , 2013King, , 2014) and China's assistance towards education development is a priority for Africa's development. As stated in the fourth FOCAC forum, The Chinese government's official resolution on training and educational assistance emphasizes that better education is the basis of, and holds the key to, social stability and economic development. Following Ketema and Hong (2009)  China's human resource development assistance to Africa (Li, 2006;He, 2007;King, 2009King, , 2013King, , 2014Bjørn, 2011;Shao, 2012;Ehizuelen, 2018) and the assessment of socio-cultural life and experiences of African trainees in China (Ismail and yang, 2003;Dong and Chapman, 2008;King, 2010;Jian, 2015) have focused more on the philosophical and contextual background. However, little focus have been placed on assessment of broader impacts of education and skill development towards individual trainees and their home countries, (Yuan, 2013;Hezron et al., 2017). Evaluation models involving broad range of methodological approaches like Kirkpatrick,1975;CSCUK, 2014, could be adopted by non-traditional donors like China to access the impact of its overseas education programs. The selection of any of these evaluation models depends on the approaches that the donor desires to employ. Hezron et al.(2017), pointed out some of the limitations of CSCUK model. For instance, difficulty of selecting relevant control group; lack of in-depth contextual data in most experimental designs; high research cost and ethical considerations. While Perna et al. (2014) noted the limitation of Kirkpatrick model as oversimplifying the benefits of training through the over-focus on the trainees' employers contrary to interaction with the wider surrounding society. China on the other hand, either do not have or rarely employ any of the above mentioned evaluation models, and access to such data is limited. As such, the present study adopted the qualitative educational approach of, using context analysis, exploratory literature review, and qualitative descriptive case study designs (Bogdan & Biklen, 2003). Ryan and Bernard (2002) regard This approach useful as it allows authors to immerse in the secondary data derived from various literature sources, and to analyze the phenomenon in depth for a better understanding of the general context, and identification of major themes. The study examined the impact of Through a review of corresponding literature and materials the present study seeks to provide suggestions towards improving the education and skill development within the Sino-Cameroon educational cooperation.

Background Literature on Sino-African Educational Cooperation
Sino-African Educational exchanges began in the 50s with Egypt and by the end of 1966 about 164 African students from 14 African countries had studied in China, and 14 Chinese teachers had worked in Africa (He, 2007;Jian, 2015). This exchanges ended abruptly due to cultural revolution of May 1966-1972. However, by 1978 African countries had established diplomatic relations with China (Li, 2007) and by the 1980s the number of African students coming to study in China began increasing (Edeh & Wang, 2018). Omoruyi et al. (2017) (Omoruyi et al., 2017). As observed by Nordtveit (2009)  for Chinese language teaching and the encouragement of teaching African languages in Chinese universities (Edeh&Wang, 2018). More so, in 2011, a total of 44 presidents and vice chancellors from Chinese and African universities met in Paris for the UNESCO China-Africa University Leaders summit to discuss how to advance university cooperation between these two parties (Omoruyi et al., 2017;Edeh&Wang, 2018). following this summit in 2012 during the FOCAC meeting, China announced its three years -African Talents Plan which sets to train 30,000 Africans, award 18, 000 government scholarships and to build cultural and vocational training facilities by 2015 (Sino graduate, 2012) in (Omoruyi et al., 2017 ). Hanauer and Morris (2014) in (Omoruyi et al., 2017 ) (Omoruyi et al., 2017). King (2014) pointed out that FOCAC pledges are not bilateral but pan-African, and are largely executed by Chinese expertise, this includes: Chinese universities or vocational colleges, Chinese think tanks, scientists, agricultural technologists or language teachers, and medical personnel. However, King (2010) asserted that there is also still the strong bilateralism that underlines the importance of understanding the way China has chosen to work with any particular country. Zheng (2016) also noted that China, like the established donors also justifies its overseas economic activities with development objectives. but such development objectives have often been subordinated to strategic, diplomatic, or commercial considerations, while maintaining that it helps developing countries, (especially African countries) to promote sustainable economic development and poverty reduction.
There are 3 major perspectives of China's development cooperation strategy. The first perspective is the Beijing's desire to secure strategic resources-those most fundamental to national security-and secondarily for diplomatic reasons. The second perspective is the Chinese aid policy which has always maintained its distance from the established aid model under the guidance of the OECD Development assistance Committee(DAC) and will not necessarily challenge the existing international aid regime. The third perspective argues that China does not have a coherent aid strategy that is carefully designed and implemented (Zheng, 2016).
Diplomatic and commercial agendas often drives the Chinese aid policy as observed by some scholars.The diplomatic agenda regards aid as an instrument for Exercising diplomatic influence on the international stage and deepening cooperation with selected countries whereas the commercial agenda views aid as a useful way of assisting domestic businesses to go international and expand exports and investments (Lum et al., 2009;Brautigam, 2009;Varrall, 2015). More so, the Chinese aid and cooperation administration in policy of non-interference and in its principles of non-conditionality, may have even less control than other donors over the recipient country (Sun, 2014: p20). for instance, the use of funding and the selection of personnel to be trained or for scholarship awards. For this reason, China have been heavily criticized for fostering corruption in Africa by some school of thoughts (Freschi, 2010;Clinton, 2011), however, others view China's approach as balanced-development (Tull, 2006;Fantu & Cyril, 2010)  The new strategy of aid to foreign countries is important for us, and we are currently reviewing old projects and practices, to learn for the future. Edeh and Wang (2018) also noted that funding , Scholarships and training are often in line with the FOCAC agenda and will involve staff in many Chinese and African ministries such as Furthermore, with increase in scholarship awards in the areas of human resource training in the recent years by donor countries like Germany, UK, Australia and China (Cuthbert et al., 2008;Woodfifield, 2009;King, 2013) studies (Baker et al., 1996;Hezron et al., 2017 ) have suggested the importance of published evaluation data in the area of educational cooperation by the emerging donors and non-OECD donors, including China and India. UNESCO (2015) report also highlighted the importance of evaluation in the area of education cooperation while asserting that often scholarships are used as a means to see aid allocations return to the donor country' as there is little evidence that scholarships build knowledge and teaching capacity within beneficiary countries. To this end, this paper agrees with Hezron et al. (2017) that case-by-case variations in trade-offs between benefits and shortcomings towards the recipient economies justifies the importance of regular evaluation studies. As such studies will assist in improving accountability and facilitate access to data and information from these donors as well as improve the understanding of overall impact in educational cooperation globally.

Education and skill development in Sino-Cameroon Education Cooperation
Since 1971 when the Republic of Cameroon established relations with the People's Republic of China, Its been over four(4) decades of strategic partnership and successive visits of officials from the both sides which has led to deepening of cooperation between Cameroon and China. With a population of about 25million people whose labour force constitute about 65% of the total population, the country's population is estimated to reach about 37,722,498million by 2035 (World population review, 2019). Although there is positive increase in population, however, 40% of the population is estimated living below the poverty level and poor access to proper education especially in the rural areas. Also lack of employable skills have been a bottle neck for the teeming population of the youths in Cameroon to secure well paid jobs resulting to high unemployment rate. Nevertheless, in seeking a better alternative towards solving its developmental issues, Cameroon have turned towards China as a reliable partner other than the traditional donor (France). Backed by strong political will, the republic of Cameroon have forged its strong relation with China on mutual economic needs and interests. While China needs Cameroon's natural resources and raw materials (oil, cotton, timber and iron) , Cameroon needs the China's rapidly built and easily financed infrastructure (Jean-pierre, 2015). the mutual interest and benefit that Sino-Cameroonian cooperation pursues is evident in the speech made the former Chinese President, Hu Jintao during an official visit to Cameroon in January 2007, that China's relation with Cameroon is sincere, based upon equality, reciprocal benefits and win -win cooperation (Omoruyi et al., 2017). technology is a serious call for concern. How do we sustain when we don't have the know-how?" he stated. This however questioned the fact about skill transfer in Sino-Cameroonian education Cooperation, and the need for impact assessment studies (Kaufman et al., 1996;Tamkin et al., 2002). As proposed by Kirkpatrick (1975) using the four-level training evaluation approach designed to assess the trainees' perspectives on the training courses they attended, by using the four levels of training outcomes namely; reaction, learning, behavior, and results.

Scholarship
As part of the long term training for Africans in China, Scholarships are awarded in different disciplines to African students of which Cameroonian students also benefit. Based on provisions of scholarships on the Chinese government scholarship website, students from Cameroon receives scholarships, not only from the Chinese government, but also from independent institutions and direct university scholarships in China. Usually, some Cameroonian student travel to China on self sponsorship(i.e without scholarship) on getting to China, some are lucky to obtain a school scholarship after one year based on their academic performance and the school regulatory system.This also concurs with the finding in the study of (Ferdjani, 2012) where low tuition and affordable cost of living are the major factors attracting self-funding African students to China. Different categories of Cameroonian students travel to China every year which include bachelors, masters and doctoral students (Bjørn, 2011;Omoruyi et al., 2017), However, the present study found that access to data, for instance, on the number of self-funding students, the number of returnees after training have proved abortive. Therefore, it is difficult to capture the number of trained returnees for a follow up assessment as reported in (Kirkpatrick, 1975)  Apart from this direct funding by both parties, there are self-generated funds that the Confucius Institute gets from tuition fees and other channels. Since the establishment of CI in Cameroon, the institute have grown from less than 200 students at inception to about 1000 steady growth of new students annually (Mbom, 2015). In 2017, the CI celebrated their 10 th anniversary and by the end of 2018, the institute boasts of over 10,000 registration from students. According to Hanban news, 1n 2017, the institute has set up 26 teaching centers with over 40 teachers and volunteers teaching Chinese language. In 2016, the CI center at the university of Maroua became the first in west Africa to graduate teachers in chinese language education. So far as reported by Kimeng (2017c), 200 have graduated from the programme whose Head of Department trained in Zhejiang Normal University. He further noted that Zhejiang Normal University has offered to train Cameroonian civil engineers for free so that they can return home and boost the local construction industry. In line with the above statement, it could be stated that, as the interest for Chinese language is growing, there's gradual shift from an ideology-based interest in Chinese language and civilization towards economic interest. Nevertheless ,the aim of the paper is not to reiterate promises made (both fulfilled and unfulfilled) within the Sino-Cameroon education cooperation, but to critically examine it impact on Cameroonians, as they are on the receiving end of the win-win cooperation.The above statement concurs with the observations of (king, 2010). 1 To this end, on the side of the Confucius institute training in Cameroon, it is no doubt that China is training and graduating home grown(Cameroonians) teachers for Chinese language teaching, however only a few number might be gainfully employed. As Hanban continues to send more native (Chinese) teachers and volunteers to assist in Chinese teaching of which usually are not Chinese language trained teacher but are opportuned to be native speakers. Again, as king (2010)  Cameroon (Kimeng, 2017a). In addition, the production of 500,000 laptops for

Cameroonian university students by China's Sichuan Telecommunications
Construction Engineering Co. Ltd funded by the China exim bank which was described as part of the e-National Higher Education Network project being put in place by government of Cameroon (Amindeh, 2018 (David, 2016;Brautigam & Hwang, 2016) Then the contracted companies usually make use of workers who are tied to contracted project rather than Chinese workers who are under labour service arrangements as shown in fig1 below. This is consistent with the notion raised by David (2016) that Chinese construction companies have used the tied support from bilateral projects (i.e., China Exim Bank's lending money to African countries for infrastructure projects that have to be carried out by Chinese firms) to become a competitive force on the Africa continent.

Improving The Education And Skill Development Through Pragmatic
Engagements With China. African countries face challenges related to shortages of a qualified labour force and institutional capacity (UNDP, 2016). Despite the substantial growth of many African economies over the last decades with an estimated real output growth of 4.1 % in 2019 (AfDB, 2018), several African nations are still struggling to transition to higher value-added economic activities due to the significant gap between demand and supply of skills required for the labor market (Ehizuelen, 2018). China through the FOCAC framework seeks to strengthen ties with African countries by adopting Pan -African method of responding to the pressing need in different African countries.
China is not the only emerging economy supporting Africa's education and skill development, Brazil and India also contributes to education and skills development in Africa through the private-sector firms which provides scholarships , corporate social responsibility programs, business strategies and training (Vazquez And Carrillo, 2014;UNESCO 2014). Nevertheless, China is viewed as a major player towards human resource development in Africa (King, 2009;David, 2016 (Sullivan, 1994;king, 2009 shown its readiness in assisting African countries towards improving the education sector. Also in 2017, Zhejiang normal university opened it first innovation center with the aim of meeting the requirement for practical education and skill transfer. The center aims also at fostering cooperation between the university and the Chinese enterprises who offer jobs and internship opportunities for foreign student in the university. The partnership between the University of Yaoundé II and Zhejiang normal University presents a more privilege for Cameroonian students to tap from the opportunities the cooperation has presented. Also, Chinese companies like Huawei, ZTE and few SOEs have realized the importance of skills transfer in the development of local economy, as a good strategy to open African market and enhance their businesses and for the structural transformation of Africa (Ehizuelen, 2018). As such, pragmatic engagements such as formal evaluation and follow up processes on the overall cooperation in education, backed by strong internal policy regulation and implementation would be required for Cameroonian people to overly appreciate China's pragmatic role in Sino-Cameroonian education cooperation.

Conclusion
The