WSJ Report Provides Clearest Overview to Date of China’s Vaccine Logistics Operation That’s Taking Shape in Africa

A trio of Wall Street Journal reporters in Asia and Africa have compiled what is the most detailed report of China’s burgeoning vaccine logistics and distribution operation that’s now ramping up from hubs in Ethiopia and Dubai among other places. 

Last November, Ethiopian Airlines and Cainiao, the logistics arm of Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba, unveiled plans to build an air bridge linking China and Africa to provide a secure cold chain to distribute hundreds of millions of jabs. Earlier this month, the two companies announced that the first flight of the new partnership transited through Addis Ababa on its way to Chad to deliver a shipment. But other than those two announcements, little else is known about the partnership or how it will operate.

The WSJ report highlights the considerable investment that Chinese and Ethiopian stakeholders are making in this new cold chain distribution network and the accompanying risks.

Key Highlights From the WSJ’s Report on China’s Sophisticated Vaccine Distribution Network in Africa

  • JACK MA’S PPE DONATIONS PAVE THE WAY: “China’s cold chain through Ethiopia has a template tested in the pandemic’s earlier days. Following an agreement last year between Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and Alibaba founder Jack Ma, Ethiopian Airlines distributed more than 14 million pieces of Chinese-made surgical masks, gloves and other protective equipment donated by the Jack Ma Foundation and Alibaba Foundation to countries in Africa.”
  • SHIPPING VACCINES IS NOT LIKE CARRYING PACKAGES OR PASSENGERS: “The vaccine effort is likely to present the two companies with challenges beyond their previous experience, logistics operators and analysts said. Requirements for vaccine logistics are more stringent than its normal cold-chain operations, they said. And Alibaba’s logistics arm also operates like a middleman platform connecting customers to third-party service providers, which exposes it to risks as it may struggle to monitor the entire delivery process, they said.”

Read the full article on the Wall Street Journal website.

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The post WSJ Report Provides Clearest Overview to Date of China’s Vaccine Logistics Operation That’s Taking Shape in Africa appeared first on The China Africa Project.



source https://chinaafricaproject.com/2021/02/22/wsj-report-provides-clearest-overview-to-date-of-chinas-vaccine-logistics-operation-thats-taking-shape-in-africa/

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