Opening Remarks delivered by Hanan Morsy, Deputy Executive Secretary and Chief Economist of United Nations Economic Commission for Africa
at Ministerial Forum on Critical Minerals, Value Chain, and Beneficiation
10 July 2026
Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire
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President Tah,
Honourable Ministers,
Excellencies,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Let me begin by congratulating the African Development Bank for convening this Forum at exactly the right moment.
The world is entering a new industrial era, one built on critical minerals. For Africa, this presents an opportunity that is perhaps as significant as independence was sixty years ago.
But opportunities do not transform economies.
Strategy does.
Africa possesses roughly 30 percent of global critical mineral reserves, yet captures less than five percent of the associated value added. That statistic should concern us far more than the size of our reserves. It tells us that our challenge is no longer geological. It is economic and institutional.
The question before us is therefore not whether Africa should participate in the global energy transition.
It is on what terms.
I would suggest that our discussions today should focus on three strategic shifts.
First, we must move from resource nationalism to regional industrialization.
Many countries understandably aspire to develop domestic processing industries.
But the economics of critical minerals rarely stop at national borders.
Battery value chains require minerals, energy, transport infrastructure, processing capacity, manufacturing capability, finance and markets. Very few countries possess all these ingredients individually.
Africa’s comparative advantage therefore lies not in twenty competing national strategies, but in integrated regional value chains under the AfCFTA, where countries specialize according to their comparative advantage while collectively capturing far greater value.
The success of our minerals agenda will depend less on what happens inside mines than on what happens across borders.
Second, we must redefine beneficiation.
Too often, beneficiation is interpreted narrowly as processing minerals before export.
That is necessary, but it is not sufficient.
The real value lies further downstream, in precursor materials, battery components, electric mobility, fertilizers, green steel, advanced manufacturing, recycling and the knowledge economy that surrounds these industries.
If we define success only as refining minerals, we risk remaining suppliers in someone else’s industrial strategy.
Our objective should be to build industrial ecosystems, not simply processing plants.
Third, financing must become as strategic as geology.
Africa does not lack investment opportunities.
It lacks sufficiently prepared, de-risked, bankable projects capable of attracting long-term capital.
That is why initiatives such as the Critical Minerals Acceleration Facility and the New African Financial Architecture for Development are potentially transformative. They shift the conversation from financing extraction to financing industrial ecosystems. They also recognize that African pension funds, sovereign wealth funds and development finance institutions should become central investors in Africa’s industrial future, rather than passive investors elsewhere.
Excellencies,
This is precisely where the partnership between ECA and the African Development Bank can make the greatest difference.
ECA contributes policy analysis, implementation support, regional value chain design under the AfCFTA, and analytical work on the African Green Minerals Strategy.
The Bank brings project preparation, financing, guarantees and the capacity to crowd in private capital.
Together, we can bridge the persistent gap between policy ambition and investment execution.
Finally, I hope the legacy of this Forum will not be measured by the quality of our declarations.
It should be measured by whether, a few years from now, Africa has more regional value chains than isolated projects; more manufacturing than extraction; more African capital financing African industry; and greater bargaining power in global supply chains.
Africa’s competitive advantage is no longer simply that we possess critical minerals.
It is that we have the opportunity to organize them into a continental industrial strategy.
That is the choice before us.
Thank you.