President Xi Jinping on Monday said China would offer another 1-billion doses of Covid-19 vaccines to African countries and would encourage Chinese companies to invest no less than $10-billion in Africa over the next three years.

The pledge of additional vaccine doses - on top of the nearly 200-million that China has already supplied to the continent - comes as concerns intensify over the spread of a new variant of the coronavirus, known as Omicron, which was first identified in southern Africa.

In a speech given via video link at the opening of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, Xi also said a China-Africa cross-border yuan centre would be set up to provide African financial institutions with a credit line of $10-billion, without giving further details.

China's total imports from Africa, one of its key sources of crude oil and mineral supply, will reach $300-billion in the next three years, Xi said, adding that the two sides would cooperate in areas such as health, digital innovation, trade promotion and green development.