“Africa, as you all know, is one of the most resource-rich regions of the world,” said Cyril Obi, Program Director of the African Peacebuilding Network at the Social Science Research Council. “But many observers have noted that in spite of all this natural wealth, Africa seems to have quite a substantial proportion of its population living under poverty.” He spoke at a recent Wilson Center Africa Program event that examined the relationship between natural resources, sustainable development, and peace in Africa. How do you explain a continent rich with natural resources where so many people live in poverty, he asked.   

Part of the answer relates to conflicts, which are a fact of life, said Dauda Garuba, Technical Advisor of the Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI). In Africa, natural resources are implicated in violent conflict when warlords and conflict entrepreneurs extract and misuse them. Natural resources—and competition over access to them—fuel and sustain full-scale intra-state wars in countries such as Liberia, Sierra Leone, Democratic Republic of the Congo, and even Nigeria, which has seen low-intensity conflict, said Garuba. Even if the existence of natural resources themselves is not the primary catalyst for conflict, said Garuba, who controls them and to what ends they are used matter. Conflict over natural resources is likely to remain a considerable threat to Africa’s economic development, said Seydina Ousmane Sene, Senior Economist at the Initiative Prospective Agricole et Rurale (IPAR). 

When government fails to hold extractive corporations accountable, natural resources may be misused, the panelists agreed. As a result, communities do not get to benefit from Africa’s natural resource wealth. Instead, they sink deeper into poverty. Resty Naiga, Lecturer at the Department of Development Studies, College of Humanities and Social Science at Makerere University, pointed to one notable example where the human cost of unsustainable resource management was high. The 2006 discovery of oil in Uganda meant industrial development displaced more than 30,000 people. That is a good example of Africa’s resource curse, she said. While industry may thrive, human life suffers. 

Governance Needed

The challenges of conflict, under-development, and a lack of domestic resource mobilization, said Garuba, stem from the absence of an effective governance framework. When African leaders uphold policies that perpetuate corruption and the illicit flow of money, he said, their policies run counter to a regional and continental vision of sustainable development. If extractive companies continue to exploit Africa’s natural wealth without accountability, Africa will be unable to develop. 

Good governance—meaning the norms, institutions, and processes for power and responsibility related to how resources are shared—is absolutely critical in overcoming the resource curse, said Naiga. It can only be achieved through a foundation of the best principles: legitimacy, accountability, transparency, and inclusiveness, said Naiga. Engaging academics and researchers as stakeholders, especially in policies like the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) is a good step forward to achieving holistic governance, said Naiga. “Without that, then it’s not worth the risk and effort,” she said.  

Bridging the Gap between the Private and Public Sector

The relationship between private, extractive industry and federal governments, said Garuba, is fraught with dysfunction. Though the state is meant to protect the security and welfare of its citizens, governments may seem to be allied with the extractive companies against the interests of the community. Civil society, said Garuba, is the tie that binds and the mechanism that rebuilds trust among communities. The expansion of civil society, he said, is key to building resilience among communities and bringing in the help of international frameworks like the Natural Resource Charter and Africa Mining Vision, which aim to assist governments in transparently managing natural resources. Civil society, in other words, must be strengthened to lay the foundation for sustainable resource management. 

Civil society and decision-makers who wish to engage civil society, must accept home-grown strategies, said Naiga. But what will it take to incorporate local knowledge into sustainable development frameworks? “In order for the community to engage with the municipality in a meaningful way, knowing their city, knowing their community, they have to be empowered,” said Sene. “They have to be educated. They also have to have a clear map of natural resources in the community and how they can benefit from that.” While civil society has the potential to act as a bridge across many sectors, said Naiga, it must focus on the people it aims to help. 

Including Everyone

Community engagement to promote resilience and sustainable development has to be gender-inclusive, said Naiga. The policies currently in place do not seem gender-responsive, she said. In the context of African natural resource governance, Naiga said that men usually make the decisions, to the detriment of women. Meanwhile, the women absorb most of the day-to-day impact, like ensuring their family’s food security and finding work-arounds in places that lack water. “Women carry the burden, but they are not included,” she said. To address this oversight, Africa needs responsive and inclusive mechanisms to ensure that all people in communities benefit from natural resource wealth.