Tipping Point

It could create 100,000 jobs within five years and lead to the export of up to $4 billion of shoes every year.

Martyn Davies, chief executive officer of Frontier Advisory, a research and strategy advisory firm based in Johannesburg, says Africa was the recipient of a huge amount of China's early ODI in the first decade of the century because of the country's need for resources to develop its economy.

However, he doubts whether the new investment in manufacturing in Africa will prove to be a sustainable trend.

Davies believes that apart from resources, the future of Chinese ODI in Africa could well be in building transport and other infrastructure

Although China remains the world's largest destination for FDI from other countries, its annual growth is beginning to stagnate.

Year-on-year growth was just 2.2 percent in the first half of last year, according to the Ministry of Commerce, a far cry from the annual growth of more than 20 percent before the financial crisis in 2008.

Stefan Sack, vice-president of the European Union Chamber of Commerce in China, says the economic slowdown in China is having a depressing effect on FDI into the country.

"As a result of the slowdown, there is less incentive for foreign companies to increase their capacity (which would require additional FDI) but just make do with existing facilities," he says.

The mix of China's FDI has changed greatly since 2004. Then some 96 percent of all FDI was in manufacturing, with services just 1.4 percent. By the end of 2013, services made up 28 percent of all FDI with manufacturing down to just 40 percent.

The government has been trying to encourage more inward investment in key service sector industries (particularly within financial services) with initiatives such as the launch of the China (Shanghai) Pilot Free Trade Zone in September 2013.

Wang Chao contributed to this story.