After reading the article on the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), I was wondering how so many low- and middle-income countries became involved with the infrastructure plan and how they had become much more invested than I would have thought. I would assume that these countries would benefit from the creations and developments of the Belt and Road Initiative, but I wonder if the rewards will be able to outweigh the current risks. I looked at some more information on the BRI, and found something that said the project was supposed to conclude by 2049, which is a fairly long period of time away in my mind. The article quotes President Biden in his speech to the United Nations: “infrastructure that is low quality or feeds corruption or exacerbates environmental degradation may only end up contributing to greater challenges for countries over time.” The article mentions earlier that AidData, a research center at the College of William and Mary, has conducted a report on BRI and China’s loans and found that there was “$843 billion in Chinese loans for 13,427 projects primarily between 2000 and 2017. This reminded me of Geoff West’s reading where he discussed how China was attempting to rapidly build more buildings and infrastructure and dramatically increase the number of cities. In such a frenzy to build and develop more, I wonder what the cost of quality and care is, and the consequences that might follow.
There were some positive moments for China, such as the address by President Xi Jinping to the United Nations regarding environmental awareness and his promise of the stop of international coal-fired power plants, as well as other things such as pledges to help other nations in diversifying energy sources as well as a proposal for a Global Development Initiative. However, I am wary of superficial goals that sound good and paint a country in a positive picture, when in reality the country does not try or gives very little effort to reach those goals. I wonder if there were more details on that and if China has concrete plans to honor their promises.
In terms of responsibilities that I think the international community should have, I think that they should keep close tabs and continuously pressuring China to be more ethically sound. In the article, it mentions how “Mr. Biden and the other Group of Seven major democracies in June committed to an infrastructure construction initiative aimed at poor countries that they called Build Back Better World, or B3W.” This was meant as a response to China, and I think a good way to react. By collaborating with other countries, it is much easier and effective to keep any particular country in check.