On November 15, 2023, Chinese President Xi Jinping and US President Joe Biden held their first face-to-face meeting in a year at the Filoli Estate in San Francisco. This was the second time the two leaders have met during Biden’s term as president, although the two have previously met several times in other official capacities. 

In remarks given ahead of the four-hour meeting, held on the sidelines of the APEC Summit, both leaders emphasised the importance of the bilateral relationship, with President Xi calling it “the most important bilateral relationship in the world.” According to President Biden, the meeting was “among the most constructive and productive we’ve had.”

As this was happening, back home in Kenya, the country is said to be looking for an equal economic partner regardless of political ideologies and is optimistic of reaping from the relentless trade tension between the US and China by hosting technology majors in Naivasha on stable energy supply.  

Two weeks ago, the government cited commitments to give unspecified incentives to investors to set up data centres in Naivasha, with access to geothermal power, as a key selling point to multinationals in technology to put up plants in Kenya. 

KenGen and Konza Technopolis Development Authority (KoTDA) recently broke the ground for the Ecocloud Data Centre located at the KenGen Smart Industrial Park in Naivasha. The data centre is being built in partnership with several investors and will be 100 percent powered by renewable geothermal energy. The project has attracted the interest of key players in the data sector including Google, Amazon Web Services, Oracle, and VMWare.

The country’s leadership is on record stating that Kenya has no interest in being drawn into some proxy war between the world’s two largest economies, with many recalling decades of Cold War tensions between the US and the Soviet Union that also played out in Africa. The government said Kenya is keen to secure its economic future and can benefit from closer partnerships with both the US and China. 

In early January, the then Trade and Industry Cabinet Secretary Moses Kuria said Kenya was not a slave to trade to any country and would not allow its resources to be exploited in the US–Chinese trade wars. While commenting on the US–China race to acquire investment shares in African economic resources, Mr Kuria stressed that African countries, including Kenya, have economic and investment relations with both Washington and Beijing, as is the case with other nations in the world.

According to some analysts, Washington’s prioritisation of Africa in its policies, as seen in the recent American–African Summit, was built on the huge natural and human potential available in the African continent. In addition, China also found important economic and investment opportunities in African countries, expecting many Chinese companies to enter African markets to increase investments in the continent. “There are no limits to African cooperation with America and China. Africa’s interest requires dealing with everyone without subjecting its will to one party at the expense of another,” Moses Kuria said.  

Both the U.S. and China have been actively engaged in Kenya. The U.S. has focused primarily on private-sector investment and market access for U.S. companies. On the other hand, Chinese-led infrastructure projects have benefitted Kenya’s overall development and have been labelled by both governments as “win-win” collaborations. 

In October, President William Ruto and his U.S. counterpart, Joe Biden agreed to expedite the Strategic Trade and Investment Partnership agreement. The agreement will increase trade and investment between the countries, boosting manufacturing and creating jobs. 

President Biden said the U.S. will work with Kenya and other nations in Africa to scale up investment in renewable energy and infrastructure “as a way to provide opportunities for jobs and industrialisations.”

Still, in October, President Ruto urged Chinese investors to exploit opportunities in the fields of energy, water and housing in Kenya. He said Kenya will support investors who will add value to the country’s abundant raw materials. 

“Kenya presents real opportunities for investment especially in transformative areas of our economy such as energy, water and housing,” President Ruto said. He made the remarks when he toured China’s Engineering Corporation Limited in Beijing. The President also witnessed the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between the Ministry of Energy and Petroleum and Energy China.  

The MoU will optimise the flexibility and reliability of Kenya’s electrical power system; it will also cover the planning, designing, transformation and modernisation of power generation, transmission and distribution lines and substations. Other aspects of the Mou include unlocking the potential of renewable energy and advanced energy storage for supporting higher domestic energy sufficiency.  

The President also witnessed the signing of another MoU with the Huawei Corporation which will allow the two parties to collaborate to develop Kenya’s ICT infrastructure and promote the digitisation of the transportation, e-government, education, and digital energy sectors advancing Kenya’s Digital Superhighway and Bottom-up Economic Transformation Agenda. It will also help cultivate digital skills and enhance capacity building.

Experts argue that the great-power competition between the US and China provides Kenya and Africa in general with economic options, and Kenya in particular stands to benefit much more from the rivalry if it maintains neutrality. 

In addition, Kenya’s notable progress in securing regional and international trade deals is positioning the country as an important trading economy. It will be crucial for Kenya to balance its overlapping and complicated relationships with the world’s two largest economies, its trade ties with neighbours in the East African Community (EAC), and its interest in advancing the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA).