BRI loses steam, no fresh Chinese investment post-Covid pandemic

 After Sri Lanka went bankrupt due to economic profligacy on count of white elephant Chinese funded projects, Bangladesh has joined Nepal by saying a big NO to any further loans from China. The two countries are now only interested in grants.

Nine years after it was launched by President Xi Jinping, the Belt Road Initiative (BRI) appears to have lost steam with virtually no new Chinese investment in third countries post-Covid pandemic.

While a section of Beijing watchers believe that this is an indicator of the hit that the Chinese economy has taken during the pandemic and as a result of its zero-Covid policy, the BRI appears to be under revaluation with recipient countries wary of the debt trap and its economic feasibility.

Bangladesh Finance Minster AHM Mustafa Kamal has publicly blamed economically unviable Chinese BRI projects for exacerbating economic crisis in Sri Lanka. He has warned that developing countries must think twice about taking more loans through BRI as global inflation and slowing growth add to the strains on indebted emerging markets.

“Everyone is blaming China. China cannot disagree. It is their responsibility,” Kamal said in an interview to Financial Times. Bangladesh owes some six per cent of its external debt to China and has sought USD 4.5 billion loan from IMF last month to tide over economic crisis.

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