China in Mauritius: The Telling of the Chinese Story

Mauritius is a small island state situated strategically in the middle of the Indian Ocean. Home to 1.3 million people, its population claims ancestry from three continents—Europe, Asia, and Africa. France, and then Britain, ruled the island as a colony from 1715 to 1968, bringing enslaved Africans to tend the sugar plantations and attracting indentured laborers from India and merchants from China. France established a plantocracy economy and made French the island's official language. Britain's legacy is mainly administrative, having founded the island's modern electoral, legal, and parliamentary systems. Notably, Britain allowed French to remain the island's official language.¹ In Mauritius today, many "ancestral" languages are taught in schools and used daily, primarily from India, China, Madagascar, and Mozambique.

This essay assesses the impact that China has had on Mauritius and how the "China story" is represented through the country's local media. Despite its small size, several actors compete for influence on the island: France and Britain, given their historic colonial ties; the United States, as an important trade and diplomatic partner; India, from where roughly 70% of the population claims ancestry; and, of course, China.

China in Mauritius: A Timeline of Engagement

The historic presence of a Chinese population sets Mauritius apart from the rest of the African continent. The earliest record of Chinese settlement in Mauritius was in 1745, and since then the island has received successive waves of Chinese immigration.² While only 3% of the country's population is "Sino-Mauritian," this population has gained significant influence in the business sector.³ In the 1970s, Sino-Mauritian Edward Lim Fat established the Export Processing Zone (EPZ) in the country, attracting Hong Kong–based investors to set up textile and manufacturing factories. The EPZ became one of the island's key pillars of development, accounting for up to 10% of GDP. From the 1970s to the 1990s, Mauritius also benefited from Chinese technical assistance in agriculture, infrastructure, and scholarships, and the two countries signed a double tax treaty.⁴ Sino-Mauritians have maintained cultural and economic ties with China, including founding the Mauritius Chinese Business Chamber, several local Chinese-language newspapers, and the first Chinese cultural center outside China. Mandarin instruction in public schools has also proliferated. The Mauritian government has acknowledged the strong ties between China and the island and the important role of Sino-Mauritians in its society: Chinese New Year is a public holiday in Mauritius, while a person of Chinese origin is featured on one of the country's banknotes.

Beijing's decision to establish a special economic zone (SEZ) in Mauritius in 2006 expanded China's presence on the island. Since 2006, two Chinese presidents have conducted state visits to Mauritius: Hu Jintao in 2009 and Xi Jinping in 2018.⁵ The past two decades have also seen the growth of China's soft- and sharp-power efforts, culminating in Xi's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). Officially launched in 2013, BRI has become the center stage for China's global influence. Today, 139 countries—39 of which are in sub-Saharan Africa—have joined BRI. Notably, however, Mauritius has not yet signed onto BRI.

Since the creation of the SEZ, China's relationship with Mauritius has increased and evolved. In 2016, China began negotiations with Mauritius for its first free trade agreement in Africa, which was signed in 2019 and entered into force in 2021. The agreement offers preferential trade terms on 8,547 goods—significantly, 96% of Chinese tariff lines. In 2016, China also established the Confucius Institute at the University of Mauritius and opened a branch of the Bank of China. More recently, in 2019, the Mauritius Safe City Project was launched using a loan provided by the Export-Import Bank of China, and Chinese real estate and smart city investments on the island are worth $2 billion.⁶ In addition to these projects, China has financed a number of key infrastructure projects such as road construction, the country's newest airport, a state-of-the-art stadium, and a dam. These different...