The NEPAD Agency is participating in the Investing in African Mining Indaba today at the Cape Town Convention Centre to promote the sustainable use of Africa’s natural resources, in line with the Africa Mining Vision.

At this year’s event, the NEPAD Agency will raise awareness of its newly established Natural Resource Governance (NRG) Programme and will also focus on fostering partnerships with the private sector and development organisations. 

NRG supports African countries to improve efficiency, transparency and sustainability of their extractive industries in order to eradicate poverty and accelerate sustainable growth. The Programme is designed around activities to be implemented under the three pillars – Knowledge Management, Capacity Development and Policy design, development and dialogue. 

The NEPAD Agency is key actor in coordinating the extractive industries activities in Africa and the Indaba provides an opportunity to discuss how the NEPAD Agency will help to implement the Africa Mining Vision on the continent.

The Africa Mining Vision is Africa’s own response to tackling the paradox of great mineral wealth existing side by side with pervasive poverty. It focuses on integrating mining much better into development policies at local, national and regional levels. That means thinking about how mining can contribute better to local development by making sure workers and communities see real benefits from large-scale industrial mining and that their environment is protected. It also means making sure that nations are able to negotiate contracts with mining multinationals that generate fair resource rents and stipulate local inputs for operations. And at regional level, it means integrating mining into industrial and trade policy.

Mrs Estherine Fotabong at the NEPAD Exhibition Stand – “Investing in Africa Mining Indaba"

Director of NEPAD Programmes, Mrs Estherine Fotabong said during a pre-event Ministerial Symposium themed Africa Mining Vision (AMV) yesterday, that mining plays a key role in transforming the continent. “African Natural Resources should contribute to the inclusive development and transformation of the Continent. For this to happen, a long term vision that puts people and the necessary investments at the centre of decision making is critical. Decisions in the extractive industries should not be driven by election calendars nor the profit margins of companies,” she said.

The Symposium brought together Policy Makers, Mining Executives, CSOs and development partners with the aim to share a vision on how the Mining Sector can better contribute to the improvement of livelihoods through poverty eradication.

Speaking on the importance of Mining for Africa’s development, AU Commissioner for Trade and Industry, Fatima Haram Acyl noted: “If we are to witness the full potential of Mining, we need to build a relationship based on trust and confidence between various stakeholders, especially Governments and Private Sector.”

Mining Stakeholders attending the Ministerial Symposium

The Symposium was centred on four high level panel discussions. One of the panel discussions focused on the “Inga Project” in Democratic Republic of Congo to illustrate the link between Infrastructure, Power, Energy and Mining.  The Grand Inga is the world’s largest proposed hydropower scheme. It is the centrepiece of a grand vision to develop a continent-wide power system. Grand Inga is a priority project for NEPAD as well as for other African development stakeholders such as the Southern Africa Development Community (SADC), EastAfrican Power Pool (EAPP) and ESKOM, Africa’s largest power utility, among others.

NEPAD Team attending Ministerial Symposium

Deliberations will continue today during the official opening of the Africa Mining Indaba which will gather the world’s most influential stakeholders including financier, investors, mining professionals, government officials in African mining.