Dr. Liu Shaonan, lecturer at the School of History at Beijing Normal University who gained his PhD in African History at the University of Michigan, was invited to the New Buds Salon organized by the Institute of Area Studies, Peking University to give a presentation entitled “Migrants, Factories, and ‘Made in China’: A History of the Chinese Diaspora in Nigeria” on April 10, 2020. The salon was moderated by Xu Liang, secretary-general of PKU’s Center for African Studies, and was attended by Prof. Wei Liming and Dr. Cheng Ying at PKU’s School of Foreign Languages, Associate Professor Cao Yin at Tsinghua University’s Department of History, Associate Professor Liu Tiannan at PKU’s School of International Studies, deputy editor Cao Kai of Xinhua News Agency’s Africa regional head bureau, as well as dozens of masters and PhD students at Peking University.

In his talk, Liu Shaonan took the Chinese diaspora in Nigeria as an example to support his argument that the existence of Chinese migrants, factories, and merchandise in Africa is not a newly emerged phenomenon in the past two decades. He further analyzed how Chinese immigrants arrived in Nigeria since the mid-20th century and how have their economic production influenced local production and local society in Nigeria.

Liu Shaonan started by reviewing the history of the Chinese diaspora in Nigeria and contended that the diaspora’s history can be divided into three stages. The first generation of Chinese diaspora in Nigeria is made up of entrepreneurs from Shanghai and Hong Kong. These entrepreneurs were mainly from Shanghai and Hong Kong and arrived in Nigeria in the years between the end of the Second World War and the 1970s. They are represented by the Shanghai-born Mr. Cha Chi Ming who established the Cha Group, which opened United Nigerian Textiles and later almost monopolized all textile production in north and central Nigeria with a radius of business across central and western Africa. Shanghai and Hong Kong merchants chose to go and invest in Nigeria based on the following reasons. First of all, the local government of various regions in Nigeria actively attracted investment from across the globe in the 1950s. Second, the 1950s saw 80 percent of Hong Kong’s textile and ceramics exports entering Nigerian market. Third, the Nigerian government requested producers from Hong Kong and other places to establish factories in Nigeria and coerced them with threats to increase taxation and by imposing limits on imports. After the start of reform and opening-up in China, some of those who had dreamed of venturing abroad came to Africa. Some of these people came because they had relatives in Africa, whereas others hoped to use Africa as a springboard on their way to developed countries in Europe and North America, but for various reasons eventually stayed in Africa. Liu Shaonan categorized these people as the second generation of Chinese diaspora in Nigeria. Shortly after China initiated its reform and opening-up strategies, Nigeria also launched its own version of “reform and opening-up” – the “economic structural adjustment program” – in the 1990s. Prior to the 1990s, Chinese State-owned enterprises had to go through Middle Eastern countries in their trades with African countries and no direct trade with them was available. The aforementioned policy adjustment in Nigeria, together with the demand of western African markets, provided opportunities for representatives of Chinese State-owned trade businesses in Nigeria to resign from State-owned businesses and start their own independent trade activities. Starting from the mid-1990s, individual businesspeople and merchants from Chinese coastal provinces represented by Zhejiang arrived in Nigeria and other western African countries. These two groups of people make up the third generation of Chinese diaspora in Nigeria.

Liu Shaonan then gave an introduction to the relations between Chinese enamels and the historical changes in Nigerian household containers. Before British colonization, products made from calabash and metal containers (brass products) acted not only as vessels but also as symbols of women’s socioeconomic status in the local traditional culture. If a family owned many such products, it implied wealth. Rich households therefore often decorated entire walls with calabash products and brass vessels. Enamels as modern industrial products were introduced into Nigeria by British colonialists in the late 19th century, who had hoped to trade them in Nigeria in exchange for palm oil and other locally produced raw materials. However, the high prices of British enamels prevented them from being widely accepted in Nigerian society. Nevertheless, enamels as a kind of container are much superior in quality and endurance than calabash products. As national industry developed, and especially after the introduction of Chinese enamels into the country, enamels were eventually accepted by the Nigerian people, and even began to be considered as local products and have replaced calabash as the symbol for wealth in traditional society. Enamel products have become the sign that Yar Gata (rich second-generations) use to show off their wealth. The also serve as dowries for Nigerian women.

Toward the end of the talk, Liu Shaonan shed light on how to do fieldwork in Nigeria as a researcher in order to acquire information of academic value. He emphasized the importance of the following factors when doing fieldwork by sharing his own lively experiences as examples.

He suggested utilizing local contacts of one’s supervisor and letters of recommendation and introduction, blending into local Chinese society through dinner parties, earning local people’s confidence as an independent researcher, and hiring local assistants to make visits and accomplish surveys and investigations that are off limits to foreign researchers.