Africa is estimated to hold approximately 30 percent of the world’s proven critical resource mineral (CRM) supplies. Many African countries, however, have yet to fully realize the full potential of these resources, mainly because the CRMs are often exported in raw form to the United States, European Union, and China. In recent years, countries in the region have expressed an ambition to reverse this traditional extraction-based model in favor of more value addition to create decent jobs.
African countries, however, face multiple challenges in setting up mineral processing facilities, including a lack of technical capacity, limited access to technology and investment, poor infrastructure, and inadequate geological knowledge. Future projections indicate an exponential rise in demand for CRMs as advanced countries rush to secure supplies for their energy and digital transitions. Yet there is generally insufficient scale to make mining and downstream processing in Africa competitive. Because no single African country has the capacity to address all these challenges, regional collaboration is key to developing green value chains across the continent.
This policy paper is one of a four-part ACET series focusing on green industrialization and economic transformation in Africa. The papers present thorough research informed by discussions with stakeholders on emerging technologies, digital public infrastructure, renewable energy, and critical minerals. The series provides policymakers with concise, evidence-based analysis and actionable recommendations on regulatory and policy measures, showing how green industrialization can drive economic transformation while addressing the bottlenecks to a just transition.
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