In December 2018, cobalt was declared strategic minerals by the Democratic Republic of Congo and
increased the mineral royalties for mining it. In this declaration, the Congolese government was
highlighting the significance of cobalt to the global supply of the high tech and green economy. The
unique concentration of global cobalt reserves in the region covering the Democratic Republic of
Congo, and Zambia’s Copperbelt (Burgess 2010) is increasingly seen as a risk for supply and ethical
sourcing for those industries reliant on the mineral. It is this, plus the heightened trade competition
between the United States of America and China whose technology industries dominate that is
lending a geopolitical slant to cobalt. David Haglund (1986) writing over three decades ago, in an
article on what he said was the new geopolitics of minerals, argued that in the future it was political
dynamics, such as the assertion of economic independence in formerly colonised countries that was
likely to shape the strategic significance of minerals. Concerted efforts by the African Union, outlined
in their Africa Mining Vision, is attempting not only to ensure the collection of more rents by African
countries for their minerals, but crucially to shift them away from being merely extractive locales and
for them to play a key role in the continents own industrialisation plans. Thus, the continents minerals
are being seen as strategic to the continents own future developments, in particular their minerals
beneficiation agenda that would like to see a manufacturing base emerge from their extractive
industries. However, countries like DR Congo and Zambia who plan for the emergence of a regional
battery economy, have to not only contend with protracted economic crisis and widening societal
inequalities, but also navigate a realignment in global politics, that sees increased competition
between the USA and China, and conflict in Europe. This paper, outlines the emergence of Africa’s
Copperbelt agenda for its critical minerals within the context of a global green transition and shifting
geopolitics. Drawing from secondary sources and discussion with policy makers, it highlights what
are seen as the possibilities, but also the pitfalls it faces in realising it.

Bio:
Dr Patience Mususa is Senior Researcher at the Nordic Africa Institute, Uppsala. Her research covers
issues of urban climate justice, mining, and urbanisation in southern central Africa. She is co-editor
together with Stephen Marr of an upcoming collection on ‘DIY Urbanism in African Cities’ with
Bloomsbury publishing. Patience is also author of the monograph ‘There Used to Be Order: Life on
the Copperbelt after the privatisation of the Zambia Consolidated Copper Mines” with University of
Michigan Press.