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1 [1] (September 8, 2025)

handle is hein.crs/wargdf0001 and id is 1 raw text is: Congessona esrc Seric September 8, 2025 China Primer: China's Global Development Initiative Shifts in the U.S. approach to foreign assistance under the Trump Administration have prompted increased interest from Congress in the People's Republic of China's (PRC's, or China's) overseas development activity. Per AidData, a nonprofit U.S.-based research group, between 2013 and 2021 PRC-based institutions made total development financing commitments of about $794 billion. Since late 2021, the PRC has engaged in international development through its Global Development Initiative (GDI), for which Beijing has so far pledged at least $11 billion. Some Members have expressed concern that the PRC could leverage development activities-such as those conducted under the GDI-to expand its influence in developing countries and enhance its strategic position. The GDI is the first of several global initiatives China has launched since 2021. Others include the Global Security Initiative (2022) and the Global Civilization Initiative (2023). Overseas and PRC observers view these initiatives as aiming to further China's vision for global governance. Background The PRC has engaged in what it now calls international development cooperation to varying degrees for decades. This development cooperation includes foreign assistance grants and loans that meet the standards for what the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) categorizes as official development assistance (ODA). China's development cooperation also includes economic development programs that would not be considered ODA, such as the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), which aims to develop China-centered-and controlled-global infrastructure, transportation, trade, and production networks. (See CRS In Focus IF11735, China's One Belt, One Road Initiative: Economic Issues.) Since the 2000s, the foreign assistance component of PRC development cooperation has consisted of development finance- and grant-supported projects. Between 2013 and 2018, loans accounted for approximately $22.1 billion (53%) of that assistance by value, with the remaining $19.8 billion comprised of grants, per the PRC's latest (2021) development cooperation white paper. (Comparatively, the United States obligated an estimated $48 billion in foreign assistance from all sources in FY2018 alone. See CRS In Focus IF10183, U.S. Foreign Assistance.) Objectives and Approach Launched by China's leader Xi Jinping during a virtual address at the United Nations (UN) General Assembly in September 2021, the GDI calls on the international community to commit to development as a priority. It sponsors development projects in eight focus areas (see Textbox). It officially aims to accelerate the enactment of Eight Focus Areas of the GDI: (with example projects in parenthesis) I. Poverty Alleviation (e.g, fertilizer distribution) 2. Food Security (e.g., emergency food assistance) 3. COVID-19 and Vaccines (e.g., PPE distribution) 4. Financing for Development (e.g., facilitation of SME loans) 5. Climate Change and Green Development (e.g., solar projects) 6. Industrialization (e.g., supporting the coordination and implementation of some UN countvy programs) 7. Digital Economy (e.g., transfer of communications equipment) 8. Connectivity (e.g., tablet computer distribution) Source: Global Development Policy Center, China International Development Cooperation Agency, accessed in August 2025. the UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, a common vision for global development adopted by all UN member states in 2015, as well as the realization of the agenda's 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), such as the elimination of poverty and hunger. In 2025, the Trump Administration stated that the 2030 Agenda and the SDGs are inconsistent with U.S. sovereignty and adverse to the rights and interests of Americans. Some analysts have referred to the GDI as a successor to, or replacement for, the BRI. Although the decline in PRC overseas development finance over the last decade suggests a turn away from the model of cooperation fostered by the BRI, PRC institutions still provide development finance for overseas projects, including those under the BRI and GDI. The BRI and GDI coexist in PRC official discourse. Among other things, the GDI calls to advance human rights through development. Some foreign analysts assert that such rhetoric prioritizes economic development over civil and political freedoms. Implementation The PRC claims it has sponsored over 400 material assistance and technical programs and nearly 700 human development projects under the GDI as of August 2025. Recipient countries span six continents and varying levels of socioeconomic development, including Cambodia, Eritrea, Peru, Singapore, and Syria. Asia and Africa each account for one third of the initiative's projects, which range from the construction of school buildings in Laos to workshops on exporting to China for African countries. China's foreign assistance agency, the China International Development Cooperation Agency (CIDCA), and Ministry of Finance are the primary agencies responsible for the implementation of the GDI. CIDCA maintains a Global