Chinese Vice-President Xi Jinping arrived in Angola on Friday on a 26-hour visit during which he will meet Angolan President Jose Eduardo dos Santos and expatriate Chinese business leaders.

Xi was met at the airport by Angolan Vice-President Fernando da Piedade Dias dos Santos, then left for a meeting with the Angolan president.

"The purpose of my visit is to reinforce our strategic relationship with our Angolan partners," he told journalists.

Angola has been China's largest trading partner in Africa for the past four years, according to China's official Xinhua news agency.

Economic ties between the two countries continue to grow, Xinhua said. From January to September this year, trade volume between the two countries reached 19.8 billion dollars (14.5 billion euros), up more than 80 percent compared with the same period last year.

On Saturday morning, Xi is scheduled to visit the Kilamba Kiaxi housing project on the outskirts of Luanda, which is being built by Chinese construction group CITIC.

Construction on the massive public housing project, which is expected to house up to 350,000 people, began in 2008.

After meeting with a group of expatriate Chinese entrepreneurs, Xi is scheduled to leave Saturday afternoon for Botswana.

The visit is part of an African tour that began this week in South Africa, where Xi signed a series of trade and energy deals.

Since the end of Angola's 27-year civil war in 2002, China has played a key role in the country's reconstruction, extending generous credit lines conditioned on the hiring of Chinese companies and repaid in oil from Africa's top petroleum producer.

Chinese Ambassador Zhang Bolun told Xinhua that China currently has 50 state-owned companies and 400 private companies working in Angola.

He estimated that China has extended 4.5 billion dollars in credit to Angola since 2002.

That figure does not include loans from the Chinese Investment Fund, which are managed in Angola by the Cabinet for National Reconstruction, which reports directly to the president and does not publish loan information.

China has assembled an expansive investment portfolio in southern Africa, particularly in Angola, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

Its resource and energy deals with the continent are seen as key to fueling its blistering economic growth, forecast to reach 10.7 percent this year.