China has lent more money to other developing countries over the past two years than the World Bank, a stark indication of the scale of Beijing’s economic reach and its drive to secure natural resources.

China Development Bank and China Export-Import Bank signed loans of at least $110bn to other developing country governments and companies in 2009 and 2010, according to Financial Times research. The equivalent arms of the World Bank made loan commitments of $100.3bn from mid-2008 to mid-2010, itself a record amount of lending in response to the financial crisis.

The volume of overseas loans by the two banks indicates how Beijing is forging new patterns of China-led globalisation, as part of a broader push to scale back its economic dependency on western export markets.