Abstract:
Sub-Saharan Africa is home to much of the world's mineral reserves.
South Africa produces 77% of the world's platinum and 46% of its
chromite. The Democratic Republic of Congo produces 53% of the
world's cobalt and 21 percent of the world's industrial diamonds.
Angola is the fifth producer of diamonds in the world and Nigeria is the
world's tenth largest producer of oil. Until the 1990s, this region did
not generate much revenue from this wealth. This situation changed in
the latter part of the 1990s. The 20 resource intensive countries in the
region started gaining more money for their extractive exports partly
as a result of increasing demand from China. This has contributed to
what is now over a decade of consistent high economic growth. This
has never before happened in the region's history. The extractives
industry now produces about one-third of the GOP of the region and
the 20 resource intensive countries contribute 79.6% of the region's
GOP. The problem is that the economic growth has not translated into
better human development in resource intensive countries-rather it seems to have widened the inequality gap. The 2005 United Nation's
report on the World's Social Situation stated that, "violence associated
with NATIONAL and international acts of terrorism should be viewed in
the context of social inequality and disintegration". It added, "Violence
is more common where inequalities are greater". Th is paper assesses
the possibility of increased conflicts in the region if the regions
extractives driven growth is not accompanied with better human
development for its growing youthful population