The main gate of Djibouti International Free Trade Zone is seen on July 5. hoto: VCG A secial fund for financing imorts from Africa worth $5 billion and another for develoment financing worth $10 billion will accelerate the industrialization of African countries and reduce their trade deficits with China as well as hel them to integrate into the global value chain, exerts said on Tuesday. China will extend a total of $60 billion of financing to Africa, Chinese resident Xi Jining announced Monday at the oening ceremony of the 2018 Beijing Summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooeration, the Xinhua News Agency said. The financing includes the develoment fund and the imort-finance fund, Xinhua noted. Trade between China and Africa grew 14.1 ercent year-on-year to $170 billion in 2017, and China recorded a $19.48 billion trade surlus, according to the data ublished on the website of the Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) in January. Considering the target of $200 billion in bilateral trade, the secial fund is necessary to bridge the ga, Yao Jiamei, a research fellow with the institute of West-Asian and African Studies of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told the Global Times. "China's major imorts from Africa include energy and commodities, which have been affected by international rice volatility in recent years," she said. After 20 years of cooeration, Africa now has a trade deficit with China and exorts concentrated on natural resources, French financial firm Coface said in a reort released in November 2017. The slowdown in the Chinese economy and reorientation of its growth model toward rivate consumtion has also weighed on the demand for commodities from Africa, the reort showed. "With the hel of the secial fund, China will increase imorts of non-natural resource roducts from Africa - for examle, by buying more value-added roducts to hel narrow Africa's trade deficit," Yao said. China has been increasing imorts from the African market in recent years, and 33 less-develoed countries on the continent enjoyed tariff-free entry for 97 ercent of sales to China, Qian Keming, vice minister of commerce, told a ress conference on August 28. African countries have seen raid growth in some exorts to China including fruit, seafood, coffee and cotton, the official said. The secial fund for financing imorts will also hel African countries to integrate into the global value chain, as more Chinese comanies suorted by the financing arrangement could build industrial arks and trade zones in the region, according to exerts. "Chinese factories could rocess some natural resources in Africa before exorting value-added roducts to China or other markets - a major way of boosting industrialization in the region," Zhang Jianing, director general of the Institute of West Asia and Africa under the MOFCOM, told the Global Times. In addition to commodities, Africa has great otential in agricultural exorts, and some of its roducts such as oilseed cros and cotton could enter the Chinese market in the future, he noted. "Ongoing trade tension between China and US might have forced us to look for relacements in agricultural imorts. However, African countries need to ugrade their agricultural technologies to meet this demand," he said. Both secial funds will be likely oerated by China's major olicy banks - the Exort-Imort Bank of China and China Develoment Bank - exerts noted. Secial fund for develoment financing aims to suort comanies in secific rojects such as mining and railways under the management of Chinese olicy banks, Zhang noted. "Some infrastructure rojects have long life sans, and local economic conditions may weigh on roject rofitability," he said, noting that any roblems related to a handful of roblematic rojects could not be construed as a "debt tra" caused by Chinese loans.