According to EU reports on the arms market in Africa, France is the country with the fastest-decreasing arms exports across the continent. Russia still dominates the defense sector, but China has been challenging Moscow across the continent in recent years. The reports also show that Turkey is the fastest-growing defense country on the continent.
DOMESTIC DEFENSE IS GROWING
African countries spent a total of $51.6 billion on their defense last year. This figure constitutes 2.1 percent of the global defense budget pie, while EU reports predict that arms import demand across the continent will rise rapidly in the medium and long term. According to EU reports, the arms market across the continent will fall significantly between 2018 and 2022, The share of European countries, including Turkey, increased. During this time period, European countries’ arms and defense imports to African countries increased by 47 percent. The countries where arms imports decreased the most were Algeria with 77 percent and Morocco with 46 percent.
RUSSIA AT THE TOP
The largest arms supplier across the continent is Russia, with a share of 40 percenta. Russia is followed by the United States with 16 percent, China with 9 percent and France with 7 percent. China, one of the continent’s major players, does not release official data. It is stated that Russia has earned over $2 billion from arms trade on the continent. Russia has earned its largest income from the sale of Su-24, Su-30, MiG-29 fighter jets and S-300 air defense systems. However, according to reports, this ratio is changing in favor of Western countries in the middle and south of the continent. Russia’s share in the arms market in sub-Saharan African countries is only 24 percent. Moscow’s arms sales are mostly carried out by the state-owned Rosoboron company.
FRANCE IS FALLING RAPIDLY
EU reports claim that a significant portion of the US arms sales to the continent are carried out “covertly.” Unlike other countries, the US arms trade is carried out by the private sector. The leading companies are Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Raytheon, Northrop Grumman, General Dynamics and L3Harris. While US weapons are sold mostly to Egypt, Morocco, Tunisia, Nigeria and Niger; rAnother surprising piece of information in the reports is that former French colonies quickly gave up on French weapons and turned to China and Turkey. China, which will become the continent’s largest trading partner with a volume of $282 billion by 2023, has also tripled its arms sales in the last three years. According to reports, 7 out of every 10 African countries are equipped with Chinese weapons.
Türkiye SHINING STAR
According to data from EU reports, Turkey is the “fastest rising arms exporter on the continent.” According to the reports, Turkey has a very wide network and agreements in the fields of politics, culture, health, infrastructure/superstructure, economy and defense on the continent, and is among the main players in Ankara’s defense exports.
According to the information, while Turkey’s defense volume on the continent was at the level of 83 million dollars in 2020, this figure increased to 460 million dollars in 2021. The biggest demand in Turkey’s arms exports to the continent is for armored combat vehicles and the TB2 Bayraktar UAV. According to comments in the reports, by purchasing weapons from Turkey, African countries “avoid having to take diplomatic sides between the US, Russia or China.”
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