Geopolitics of Gas Pipelines & Critical Minerals on the African Continent

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Can economic investments in Nigeria and Morocco benefit food and fertilizer security in West Africa?

• The Atlantic African Gas Pipeline (AAGP) project is touted as one of the most ambitious energy projects in West Africa because of its regional scale and global economic significance. The 6,900-kilometer pipeline is planned to cross 13 West African countries with a capacity of 30 billion cubic meters per year.
• The new Morocco–Nigeria pipeline highlights the importance of economic growth and can serve as an example of conflict resolution through economic cooperation.
• By strengthening trust and understanding among states, the project has the potential to contribute to regional stability, create jobs, and attract international investment. Focusing on economic cooperation between Morocco and Nigeria also presents opportunities to help stabilize the West African region.

The **Nigeria-Morocco Atlantic African Gas Pipeline project** increases both Morocco’s and Nigeria’s roles in the energy and critical minerals sectors on the African continent.

The most recent discussions held between the Moroccan National Office of Hydrocarbons and Mines (ONHYM) and Morocco’s ambassador to the United States Youssef Amrani, and Acting U.S. Assistant Secretary of Energy Tommy Joyce, revolved around the status of the Morocco-Nigeria gas pipeline, that will link Morocco to Nigeria’s vast natural gas resources.

Outside of the U.S. government, a variety of international actors have increasingly showed interest in the Morocco-Nigeria gas pipeline corridor project. The UAE government, the European Investment Bank, the Islamic Development Bank, and the OPEC Fund have all agreed to provide financing toward the development and construction of the gas pipeline.

The Strait of Hormuz crisis in the Persian Gulf revealed to the world that it is a key international waterway for around one-third of the world’s fertilizer supplies. Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar are all fertilizer producers. This is not just about shipping lanes in the Strait of Hormuz, since fertilizers are needed to prevent food insecurity on the African continent. The issues of fertilizer procurement and food production is particularly pressing in West African countries where farming is prevalent, and thus the link between domestic conflicts and food security is immediate across the entire African continent, but most concentrated in the West African and Sahel regions.

African countries like Morocco and Nigeria have the natural resources required to make their own fertilizer, which have raised questions over sovereignty and food insecurity during the ongoing domestic conflicts in the Sahel. Morocco’s OCP Group is launching a strategy to supply Africa with phosphate fertilizers, one of the other fertilizer sources, in addition to nitrogen fertilizers. Nigeria’s Aliko Dangote — the African continent’s wealthiest man — is pouring US$40 billion into an energy and fertilizer strategy that plans to quadruple urea fertilizer output in Nigeria. Mr. Dangote will use Nigeria’s ample natural gas reserves to accomplish this goal.

This means that a much-needed shift, from export-oriented to domestic supply chains, must occur throughout regions of Africa. The question of whether the nascent Morocco-Nigeria gas pipeline corridor project will benefit West African food production and security in the Sahel is uncertain at this time. Global investors have their own interests in securing gas supplies from Nigeria and other critical minerals, such as Morocco’s phosphate resources, to produce food outside of the African market using fertilizer inputs from Africa’s lucrative natural resource sectors.

In conclusion, **the food security problem** throughout the African continent is relevant to ongoing conflicts and regional security concerns in the West African region. The series of geopolitical crises over the past five years — most recently exemplified by the war between the U.S. and Iran — has heightened fears of food insecurity among countries that rely on the global fertilizer trade to support their agricultural production.

This is why economic cooperation between Morocco and Nigeria should begin by addressing food insecurity issues to prevent domestic conflicts in the Sahel from spilling over into the West African region. Economic cooperation between Morocco and Nigeria can attract international investment and create mutual interests between states, both of which are important elements of conflict resolution and regional stability. However, it is more important for new economic investments to show results in improving infrastructure for food and fertilizer security across the West African region.

Photo by Prithvi Shetty on Unsplash

Does stability in the Eastern DRC hinge on the U.S.-China competition to secure critical minerals?

• A fragile ceasefire agreement between the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and a rebel group, M23, is also linked to the high-stakes struggle between the United States (U.S.) and China over critical minerals in the DRC.
• Companies based in China own or operate as much as 80 percent of the critical mineral production in the DRC. The U.S. has condemned the mining practices of Chinese companies in the DRC as inhumane and blamed them for instability in the region.
• Now, a $100 million budget will be established to police the mines through partnerships with the U.S. and United Arab Emirates, Congo’s mining regulator announced in late April.
• This new plan for mine security follows other recent deals that “give U.S. companies preferential access to Congo’s copper, cobalt, lithium, and tantalum, aiming to counter China’s dominance.

Currently, there is a U.S. ban on **“conflict minerals”** imported from places like the DRC. Chinese-operated Congolese mines are accused of using child labor and other illegal practices.

U.S. Congressman Chris Smith of New Jersey, who is chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Africa, said at a hearing last year:

“The United States must break its dependence on minerals that finance the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) — often extracted through forced child labor — and stop indirectly supporting the CCP’s efforts to fuel instability and regional conflict in Africa.”

The European Union, along with the United Kingdom, Australia and Canada, share mutual concerns with the United States about China’s investment in the DRC’s minerals.

Lauren Johnston of the South African Institute of International Affairs **wrote **in a recent article for the journal Welternährung:

“Given the importance of Africa to certain global and Chinese supply chains, China-Africa trade ties are hence more important to China than ever…The race for Africa’s minerals supplies to power new industries … in theory places African nations in a newly powerful and important negotiating position.”

Central Africa’s Great Lakes region, which includes the DRC and Rwanda, is a major producer of critical minerals used in technology such as smart phones, laptops and electric cars.

Such minerals — known as blood minerals by some, or critical minerals by others — are located in the eastern areas of the DRC near the Rwandan border, where the most intense fighting is taking place with rebels known as the March 23 Movement, or M23.

The fighting has disrupted mine operations in some areas controlled by rebels. M23 may have a broader strategy to not just control mines, but to replace local authorities with Rwanda’s support and to take over trade routes and local taxation.

The Congolese government considers M23 to be backed by Rwanda. Previous attempts at peace talks in Angola fell apart, and fighting intensified between the rebels and the DRC. The warring sides are now open to a new agreement, with the U.S. and Qatar serving as mediators.

The DRC and M23 accused each other of ceasefire violations earlier this year, so the conflict lingers without any predictability that the attacks in the Eastern DRC will stop in the future.

In closing, **the rising prices of food, fertilizers and energy** provide the foundation for another series of global instability, from which the COVID-19 Pandemic had already sowed the seeds of chaos in various countries from the African continent to North America and beyond.

The conflict in the DRC is not only about a domestic ethinic problem, or a historical enmity, because the DRC has all of the world’s most important natural resources. If the conflict erupts into a broader war, then mineral mining projects — and hopes for peace — in the affected areas could be further stalled.

In the DRC and Rwanda, strategy is synonymous with ethnic animosity. That is how the long game will be played. In addition to rebel groups and conflict, the rising prices of energy and food is in response to emerging global market trends in the politics and economy of natural resources.

I publish a newsletter covering current affairs topics and global commodities markets in [**The Long Game Brief**] every week.

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