But despite all this, new challenges have emerged in China-Africa relations. Some African countries have complained about their trade deficits with China while some are frustrated with certain underperforming Chinese projects. For China, the challenge is how to meet African countries' growing need for help and cooperation, and explore a sustainable approach to China-Africa cooperation that both synergizes the development needs of the two sides and increases the benefit perception among the African people.

Xi will visit South Africa for the upcoming summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, which will also be attended by leaders from 50 African countries as well as the Chair of the African Union Commission. It will be the second of its kind after the Beijing summit in 2006 and the first FOCAC summit held in Africa. Xi will also pay state visits to Zimbabwe. This round of intensive high-level engagements will be a new milestone in the history of China-Africa relations, which will greatly boost China-Africa solidarity and raise China-Africa relations to a new level.

Politically, leaders of both sides will chart the course for the future growth of relations. They will reaffirm their commitment to upgrading the China-Africa new strategic partnership and call for forging a community of shared interests and shared future.

The two sides will discuss ways to enhance mutually beneficial cooperation by exploring industrial alignment, production capacity cooperation and technology transfer. They are also likely to announce progress in key projects such as the Addis Ababa-Djibouti railway and Mombasa-Nairobi railway funded and undertaken by China, which will further strengthen the "backbones" of Africa's infrastructure networks.

And the two sides will enhance cooperation on global issues such as UN reform, climate change, 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and counter-terrorism, and unveil new measures to strengthen people-to-people exchanges.

This time-tested partnership now stands at a new starting point, and there is every reason to expect that it will embrace a brighter and more youthful tomorrow.

The author is an analyst with the Foreign Ministry of China.