Mouhamadou Moustapha Dieng has an office in Xiaobei, a neighborhood in Yuexiu district in Guangzhou, capital of South China's Guangdong Province.

Originally from Senegal, Dieng has been working in China for more than 10 years, primarily in the trading and shipping businesses.

"It has gotten tougher to do business in Guangzhou," Dieng said.

Even though most of the African merchants in the city have spent years operating their businesses here, they live in a fundamentally uncertain situation and worry about the possibility that upcoming immigration regulations may change everything. 

As managing director of Teranga Trading Co - a Senegalese-owned company engaged in global port services - Dieng said he has established close relationships with warehouses and suppliers in Guangdong.

Although he has built a life for himself in Guangzhou, he has to worry about his visa almost every year, he said. He now thinks doing business here is less convenient than it was before.

Over the last decade, African traders have forged an entrepreneurial chain that covers Africa, Europe, North America, the Middle Asia, Southeast Asia and China.

Through this chain, many Africans moved to Guangzhou, where they created communities in Xiaobei and Sanyuanli. African immigrants mainly work in wholesale, logistics and services such as restaurants and hair salons.

Around that time, local authorities began paying more attention to the city's African communities, which possibly led to stricter visa checks, said Li Zhigang, professor at the School of Geography and Planning at Sun Yat-Sen University.

Although the Exit and Entry Administration Law took effect two years ago, it has left much to be decided by the local governments, which are likely to be influenced by public opinion.

"Provinces may have more restrictive provisions for managing immigration," Li said.

Africans accounted for about 14 percent of the 118,000 foreigners living in Guangzhou as of October 25, Guangzhou vice mayor Xie Xiaodan said in a press conference in October.

Xie noted that there were about 16,000 legal African immigrants living in Guangzhou as of October 25, 2014, and the local government has continued to crack down on illegal immigration.

During a press conference in February, Xie said that illegal immigration ­issues related to African communities in Guangzhou were due to their expired visas, Guangzhou-based Yangcheng Evening News reported in February. 

However, Xie noted that visas could be renewed and local authorities will provide better services to foreigners in the city.

Getting expensive

It looks as if the population of Baohanzhi street, a popular area for African residents, has dwindled since the end of 2014, said Li Dong, an independent photographer who has been working on African immigrants' story for more than four years.

"Many Africans used to go grocery shopping here at 6 pm, but you can only see one or two people at that time today," Li told the Global Times on July 20.

Many stores in the two major wholesale markets in Guangzhou where Africans used to do business have closed.

Like Dieng, many African merchants expect booming trade between China and Africa, which may bring them new business opportunities.

Trade between China and Africa was steady in 2014, according to a business review that China's Ministry of Commerce published in January.

From January 2014 to November 2014, trade between China and Africa grew 5.4 percent year-on-year to about $201 billion.

However, there are still certain portions of exports from China to Africa, separated from the official trade volume, remaining untraceable, a publicity representative from the Guangzhou Municipal Commission of Commerce who prefers anonymity told the Global Times on July 20.

Li from Sun Yat-Sen University said that the number of African businessmen in Guangzhou has been declining since last year. The decline is due to the changing investment and living environments.

Still, African businessmen and some of their Chinese partners said that the strengthening yuan has also increased the cost of running a business in the country.

"Everything is becoming very expensive in now - for example workers and land," Dieng said, noting that many companies are less competitive than in past years.

Dai Lanlan, a Guangzhou resident who has been working with businessmen from Togo, told the Global Times Monday that certain parts of Africa are still affected by the economic downturn, which may also influence trade between China and Africa.

What is the future?

However, the number of African people involved in criminal activity accounted for only a small portion of the total number of African immigrants, Li said.

E-mail and faxes sent to the local authorities such as Municipal Commission of Commerce as well as People's Government of Guangzhou Municipality to ask why there have been increased inspections in Xiaobei and Sanyuanli and how they work with African communities in the city were not answered by press time.

On its website, the local government said that it is conducting a campaign to comprehensively clean the streets to improve living standards for local residents.

Although people who do business with Africans have a good attitude toward African communities in Guangzhou, many local residents have not had enough contact with Africans to know much about them.

Several African immigrants told the Global Times they have written at least 10 petitions to the government that asked for a meeting face to face to discuss how to improve the living and investment environments. They didn't receive a reply.

Dieng from Teranga Trading Co said he has been working as a leader of the Senegalese community in Guangzhou for five years. One major issue is the lack of communication between African communities and local authorities.

"We only go to the government when we have problems," Dieng said.