Africa Mining Vision

interventions and coordination of public, private and community interests at all levels in order for a resource-based development and industrialization strategy in Africa to be brought to fruition at the continental level. In addition, there is a need to identify, at national and regional levels, anchor projects that would underpin the strategy.

However, Africa is now in a very different historical and socio-economic environment than the one the Nordic countries confronted. Africa has to face different entry barriers, which are compounded by the weight of the continental debt, its levels of poverty and capacity dearth. In order to realise its significant resources potential, Africa needs to overcome its severe infrastructure constraints. In addition, to avoid the resource “enclave” resources development of the past, Africa needs to ensure that the numerous resource and resource-based economic linkages are realised locally, within the continent.

As a first step in achieving these, an African Spatial Development Programme (SDP) has been proposed, consisting of a network of key Development Corridors across Africa to realise the continent’s resources and associated potential. The SDP aims to synchronize infrastructure provision with users to enhance investment potential and to provide economic rigour for infrastructure investments. It helps to vet projects using solid economic/business rationale, thus achieving an effective investment prioritization of infrastructure projects.

For the SDP to be successful there is need to create opportunities for local participation, particularly in the provision of good and services. These opportunities can be discerned if the minerals industry is unbundled to identify entry-points for (i) increasing local upstream support (supplier/input industries) sectors; (ii) enhancing downstream industries based on increased local beneficiation and value addition of goods; (iii) facilitating lateral migration of mining technologies to other industries; (iv) increasing social, human, knowledge and institutional capital (which can be used in other sectors); (v) promoting the development of sustainable livelihoods in mining communities; and (vi) creating small-and medium-sized enterprises and a more balanced and diversified economy with greater multiplier effects and potential to create employment.

The role of regional cooperation and integration in reducing transaction costs, establishing intra-regional synergies, enhancing competitiveness and realizing economies of scale that would catalyse minerals cluster development should not be underestimated.

However, for goods, services, capital and other factors to freely flow in the regional spaces, there is need to expedite intra-regional harmonization of laws, regulations and fiscal regimes, among other critical factors.

Such a Resource-based African Industrialisation & Development Strategy (RAIDS) based on using Africa’s significant resources endowment (comparative advantage) to catalyse growth in other sectors could provide a viable component of an integrated and sustainable growth & development strategy for Africa. It would maximise the resource sector linkages by building integrated resource industrial clusters (up-, side- & downstream linkages) and the development of high-level skills within the clusters, through accelerated investment into Human Resource Development (HRD) and Research and Development (R&D), to enable Africa to incrementally build a sustainable competitive 5