Migration of Chinese people in Ghana dates back to the 1940s.
Originally, most came from
Hong Kong
Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China ( abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delt ...
; migration from
mainland China
"Mainland China" is a geopolitical term defined as the territory governed by the People's Republic of China (including islands like Hainan or Chongming), excluding dependent territories of the PRC, and other territories within Greater China. ...
began only in the 1980s. The China Africa Research Initiative at Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International studies https://www.sais.org cites the total number of Chinese workers in Africa in 2018 as 201,057 as per the National Bureau of Statistics of China which is corroborated by other sources such as The Almanac Of China's Foreign Economic Relations and Trade, and The China Annual Bulletin Of Statistics Of Contracted Projects. This figure indicates a steady decline from the previous years 2015-2017 but however, ostensibly does not account for informal migrants such as traders and shopkeepers.
Migration history
The earliest ethnic Chinese migrants to Ghana were of
Hong Kong
Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China ( abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delt ...
origin. They began arriving in the late 1940s and early 1950s, when both territories were still part of the
British Empire
The British Empire was composed of the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates, and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom and its predecessor states. It began with the overseas possessions and trading posts esta ...
.
These sojourners stayed in Ghana for periods ranging from a few years to several decades, but they never came to consider Ghana their home.
The migrants consisted largely of men who came to Ghana alone and worked as employees in Chinese-owned factories, while their families remained behind in Hong Kong. Originally, they were concentrated in western Ghana, but after Ghana achieved independence, the
Kwame Nkrumah
Kwame Nkrumah (born 21 September 190927 April 1972) was a Ghanaian politician, political theorist, and revolutionary. He was the first Prime Minister and President of Ghana, having led the Gold Coast to independence from Britain in 1957. An in ...
government began implementing plans to promote development in the eastern part of the country, and as a result, they began moving towards Accra and
Tema
Tema is a city on the Bight of Benin and Atlantic coast of Ghana. It is located east of the capital city; Accra, in the region of Greater Accra, and is the capital of the Tema Metropolitan District. As of 2013, Tema is the eleventh most popul ...
.
Aside from individual migrants, there was also an official contingent from the
People's Republic of China
China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...
(PRC) for a brief period in the 1960s. The PRC provided a variety of military assistance to Ghana in the 1960s, including a loan for an arms factory in 1962 (which was never constructed) and the dispatch of military advisors in 1964. After the
1966 coup which overthrew Nkrumah's government, Ghana expelled 430 PRC nationals, including three intelligence officers and thirteen guerrilla warfare specialists.
In the late 1960s and early 1970s, some of the Hong Kong migrants began to bring their wives and children over to Ghana.
Migrants from Shanghai also began to arrive round this time.
Due to further political unrest in the 1970s and 1980s, including two coups by
Jerry Rawlings
Jerry John Rawlings (22 June 194712 November 2020) was a Ghanaian military officer and politician who led the country for a brief period in 1979, and then from 1981 to 2001. He led a military junta until 1992, and then served two terms as the de ...
, many of the Chinese migrants returned to Hong Kong. However, with the economic
reform and opening up
The Chinese economic reform or reform and opening-up (), known in the West as the opening of China, is the program of economic reforms termed " Socialism with Chinese characteristics" and "socialist market economy" in the People's Republic of Ch ...
in the PRC, migrants from
mainland China
"Mainland China" is a geopolitical term defined as the territory governed by the People's Republic of China (including islands like Hainan or Chongming), excluding dependent territories of the PRC, and other territories within Greater China. ...
began arriving just as the Hong Kong migrants were flowing out. Migration from mainland China intensified in the 1990s; some came as employees, but most were independent traders running import-export businesses or restaurants.
The sources of migration have also expanded; whereas earlier migrants came mostly from Hong Kong or Shanghai, later Chinese migrants have arrived from
Guangdong
Guangdong (, ), alternatively romanized as Canton or Kwangtung, is a coastal province in South China on the north shore of the South China Sea. The capital of the province is Guangzhou. With a population of 126.01 million (as of 2020) ...
and
Henan
Henan (; or ; ; alternatively Honan) is a landlocked province of China, in the central part of the country. Henan is often referred to as Zhongyuan or Zhongzhou (), which literally means "central plain" or "midland", although the name is al ...
as well as the
Republic of China
Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the northeast ...
on
Taiwan
Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the nort ...
.
Business and employment
The earliest Hong Kong migrants were employed in a variety of industries in Ghana, including a failed
tobacco-growing venture, a factory in
Takoradi
Sekondi-Takoradi is a city in Ghana comprising the twin cities of Sekondi and Takoradi. It is the capital of Sekondi – Takoradi Metropolitan Assembly and the Western Region of Ghana. Sekondi-Takoradi is the region's largest city and an indus ...
producing cooking implements, and imitation wax print clothing.
The owners of these ventures rarely visited Ghana.
In the 1990s and 2000s, large Chinese companies became active in Ghana's construction sector, while individual Chinese traders gained a large amount of influence in retailing of textiles, electrical appliances, and daily-use goods.
Under the Ghana Investment Promotion Act of 1994, any foreigner can open a retail business with an investment of
US$
The United States dollar (symbol: $; code: USD; also abbreviated US$ or U.S. Dollar, to distinguish it from other dollar-denominated currencies; referred to as the dollar, U.S. dollar, American dollar, or colloquially buck) is the official ...
300,000, as long as it employs 10 local citizens, subject to maintenance of a certain minimum volume of trade.
More recently, other Chinese are engaged in small-scale
gold mining
Gold mining is the extraction of gold resources by mining. Historically, mining gold from alluvial deposits used manual separation processes, such as gold panning. However, with the expansion of gold mining to ores that are not on the surface ...
, as well as providing funding and
heavy equipment
Heavy equipment or heavy machinery refers to heavy-duty vehicles specially designed to execute construction tasks, most frequently involving earthwork operations or other large construction tasks. ''Heavy equipment'' usually comprises five e ...
to other miners.
Integration and community
The Chinese population in Ghana itself are largely transitory, and there is some resistance among them to the idea that they belong to a "community". Most of the migrants came with the intention of seeing the world and making money, rather than settling down in Ghana.
In order to obtain Ghanaian nationality, one must be married to a citizen of Ghana or be able to speak and understand one of the indigenous
languages of Ghana
Ghana is a multilingual country in which about eighty languages are spoken. Of these, English, which was inherited from the colonial era, is the official language and lingua franca. Of the languages indigenous to Ghana, Akan is the most widely ...
. The Chinese who have lived in Ghana for most of their lives have acquired
Ghanaian citizenship, which is granted without any discrimination.
Local traders have protested against the influx of Chinese traders selling imported goods, and accuse them of breaking investment laws.
In late 2007, local traders organised protests in Accra which accused the Chinese of unfair competition and trading in fields for which they were not qualified.
In turn, Chinese migrants complain of arbitrary treatment by Ghana's police. On one day in February 2009, officers of the
Immigration Department
The Immigration Department of the Government of Hong Kong is responsible for immigration control of Hong Kong. After the People's Republic of China assumed sovereignty of the territory in July 1997, Hong Kong's immigration system remained la ...
arrested over 100 Chinese people in a single day, due to Chinese engagement in illegal gold mining; in response, forty-one Chinese businesspeople signed an open letter of protest to the Immigration Department. They attributed the sudden crackdown to the government's desire to protect local merchants in the face of the worsening economy.
See also
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Ghanaian people
The Ghanaian people are a nation originating in the Ghanaian Gold Coast. Ghanaians predominantly inhabit the Republic of Ghana and are the predominant cultural group and residents of Ghana, numbering 30 million people as of 2020, making up 85% ...
*
China–Ghana relations
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Chinatowns in Africa
This article discusses Chinatowns in Africa. There are least three major Chinatowns in Africa.
As former colonies of Europe, the coastal African nations of Madagascar, Mauritius, and South Africa were the main receiving points of Chinese immi ...
References
Notes
Sources
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Footnotes
Further reading
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External links
Ghana Central-China Chamber of Commerce from the
PRC Ministry of Foreign Affairs
{{Use dmy dates, date=February 2020
Asian diaspora in Ghana
Ethnic groups in Ghana
Ghana
Ghana (; tw, Gaana, ee, Gana), officially the Republic of Ghana, is a country in West Africa. It abuts the Gulf of Guinea and the Atlantic Ocean to the south, sharing borders with Ivory Coast in the west, Burkina Faso in the north, and To ...