Page 132 - Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program Proceedings 2017-18

School of Humanities and Social Science
Division of Social Science

Belt and Road Initiative

Supervisor: PARK Albert Francis / SOSC Co-Supervisor: CHEUNG Chi Man / SOSC
ANGELA TRITTO / IEMS
Student: DENG Weiye / GCS Course: UROP1100, Spring

This report summarizes the supervisee’s two pieces of work contributed to the research project “Belt & Road Initiative”
(BRI) with the guidance of Prof. Albert Park and his research assistants Mr. Cheung Chi Man and Ms. Tritto Angela. Firstly,
to establish a framework of the various theories about the determinants of the Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), this first
period saw the accomplishment of a literature review about the FDI theories published in the renowned journals in
finance and economics. Since the supervisee is also undertaking a Capstone Project with a topic of the Chinese
Outbound Direct Investment (ODI), Mr. Cheung assisted conducting linear regression analyses on the determinants of
the Chinese ODI on two different datasets compiled separately from the CEIC data company and the American
Enterprise Institute. The preliminary results provide insights into the general picture of the Chinese ODI and identify
several interesting features.

China/Africa Links Project

Supervisor: SAUTMAN Barry Victor / SOSC
Student: LAI San Yu / PHYS-IRE Course: UROP1100, Fall

This investigation was centered upon the behavior of Chinese citizens and migrants in Africa and their relationship with
African locals, both personally and economically, by documentary analysis. In the first part, individuals and companies
engaged in upstream and downstream agricultural services, such as agricultural processing and production of
agrochemicals, are examined; various examples are found in reports and their actions in Africa documented. In addition,
the degree of isolation of Chinese people living in Africa, in aspects such as linguistic, physical and social isolation,
especially as compared to other non-local peoples, are investigated as a part of the research; the result shows that other
populations, not limited to the Chinese, engage in self-isolation.

Supervisor: SAUTMAN Barry Victor / SOSC
Student: ZHANG Xinyuan / GCS Course: UROP1000, Summer

The objective of this essay is to analyze the situation of Chinese Foreign Direct Investment in Ethiopia from existing data.
The essay is going to start with a background introduction of Africa and Ethiopia in the Belt and Road. Then follows the
analyze of Chinese investment from the perspectives of both countries. It is found through this process that Chinese FDI
in Ethiopia has experienced a growth and generated benefits for both countries. This research provides a preliminary
overview of the Chinese investment in Ethiopia under the Belt and Road Initiative, conducted based on mainly second-
hand data. In-depth investigations in this issue are still encouraged in the future.

Internet Finance and Microcredit in China
Supervisor: TSAI Kellee Sing / SOSC
Student: ZHANG Junyao / GCS Course: UROP1000, Summer

Driven by the policy support for inclusive finance, P2P lending platforms as an Internet financial product in China have
experienced an explosive growth over the past few years. Nevertheless, since online P2P lending ascended from an
almost regulation void in China, problems related to investment risks began to emerge and rang the alarm bells for the

122