Japan’s economic diplomacy in colonial Africa during the inter-war period

Africa's economic growth has been faster than the world average since 2000, showing relative buoyancy in a period of economic recession. Japan has recently been heavily involved in building a global system of political economy. In the mid-1930s "cotton diplomacy" or "primary products purchasing strategy" was proposed in Japan to prevent the revision of the Congo Basin Treaty. This chapter examines the revision of the Congo Basin Treaty which defined Japan's relations with colonial Africa and Japan's reaction to it. It studies the "Japan's Trade Relations with Africa in the Inter-War Period", based on pre-war Japanese consular reports. Japan needs more powerful measures of national policy in East Africa than in buying wool in South Africa. Since the Union in 1910, South Africa had made much progress in development, but because of market conditions, transport difficulties, and other problems, none of the advances were on a very large scale, except for gold mining.