—An interview with Li Jianhua, Executive Chairman of JinheBaituanqianqi Enterprise Co, Ltdw
ByHe Liwei; Photo Provided by Li Jianhua and Ge Liang; Translated by Meg Lee
When the baton of the relay race to helpKenyan girl Seve Gat realize her dream was passed onto Baituanqianqi, LiJianhua, executive chairman of Jinhe Baituanqianqi was determined to make herChina dream a reality.
In the meantime, as they accompany Seve toget closer to her dream, these successful entrepreneurs are actually launchingtheir own Africa dream.
China Investment: How do you see thejourney of photoshopped Kenyan girl Seve Gat from faking a China vacation toactually visiting China?
Li Jianhua: Seve‘s act to photoshop herphotos is voluntary, bold, obsessed and innovative. I think it’s verysignificant.
Seve is brave in pursuing her dream,expressing herself, and creative enough to carry out her dream, which is hercharm.
The fact that she faked a China vacationshows this African youth’s desire and passion for a beautiful life. Such isuniversal. Such aspiration is universal. It strikes a responsive chord in thehearts of the general public, which is crucial for her case to get spread to awider audience, so she became an internet sensation before finally winningsupport and realizing her dream.
Another very important condition is hergood luck. Seve’s China dream happens to take place against the backdrop of theJohannesburg Summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, when thestrategic cooperation between China and Africa is also driving the people-to-peopleexchanges, which offers her an opportunity to get outside help and realize herdream.
Although Seve’s China dream is only a smallincident in the bigger picture, I think it has a lot for us to ponder.
China Investment: Why did Baituanqianqi decideto help Seve with her China dream?
Li Jianhua: It’s first of all out of the appreciation ofSeve’s daring pursuit of her dream. This is our emotional start, very simple,very pure, because we, as entrepreneurs, are dreamers ourselves. We seek outdream in Africa, while Seve’s dream is China. China and Kenya, or China andAfrica, these dream elements lead us to see that Baituanqianqi’s dream and Seve’sdream are mutually beneficial, even interoperable. In other words, they are inessence one dream. This is where we are touched and inspired.
We know very well that dreams arebeautiful, but it takes courage, perseverance and dedication to make them cometrue. We hope that in the course of helping Seve realize her dream, ours couldalso come true, or at least it would encourage us to stick with our dream andbeliefs.
In the course of assisting Seve to achieveher dream, our gains greatly surpassed our relatively simple expectations.First, through supporting Seve’s China dream, Baituanqianqi came across ChinaInvestment, and through China Investment, got into touch with David Kabiru,counsellor with Kenyan Embassy in China, and many more African youths inChina. This helps us expand ourresources and network, which is very crucial for our next stepdevelopment.
What’s more, from the extensive contactsand information exchanges, we get to know more about the charm of Africanyouths, and especially about David Kabiru, who, as a diplomat, spoke highly ofChina and China-Africa relations, and has positive expectations for bilateralties as well as for Chinese enterprises to invest in Africa. Such information,which we hadn’t truly come across before, nor had we deeply grasped, isprecious for Baituanqianqi. It can besaid that while supporting Seve to achieve her China dream, we come to knowAfrica more and deeper. In the meantime, we are more steadfast in our beliefsto go to Africa and take root there.
All this has laid good foundation forBaituanqianqi to go to Africa. It also makes us feel that while helping Seveapproach her China dream, we are already making out own dream come true.
China Investment: How does Baituanqianqi view “AfricaOpportunity”?
Li Jianhua: Baituanqianqi is a platform for enterprises inthis new era. It is more like an enterprise alliance, with key elements ofhuman resources, assets, intelligence, industry, etc. I should say its comprehensive strength isremarkable. As a platform proper, wehave always been working to provide quality services for enterprises, laying abetter foundation and direction for the development of the next 30 years.
Against the strategic background of theBelt and Road Initiative — the Silk Road Economic Belt and 21st CenturyMaritime Silk Road — and China-Africa cooperation, Africa means the futuretrend and opportunity. At present, a message sent out in China is pointing toone trend, that is, “going global”, be it the demand of supply-front reform atmacro level, or transition and adjustment for enterprises. And Africa is a major director for “goingglobal”.
In fact, many enterprises on the platformof Baituanqianqi have already stepped out of China into Africa. Some haveinvested in Uganda and South Africa. This is also the next major developmentdirection for the platform as well as the motivation for upcoming marketresearch. All of this requires us to truly and comprehensively understandAfrica.
Maybe for most Chinese, Africa stillremains in the old stereotype — poor, hot, savage, uncivilized. But it is not so. We need to rediscoverAfrica and update our ideas. We should say we have already started to act, justlike our active participation in Seve’s China trip, which has laid thefoundation for our emotional and cognitive engagement with Africa.
Now Baituanqianqi is already mapping out asustainable plan for going to Africa. It is our hope to continue our closecontact and cooperation with China Investment (Africa) and to engage andinteract more with many more African countries. We also hope China Investment(Africa) would continue to be the eyes and think tank for us entrepreneurs.