Why Africa Must Build Power Grids to Secure Its Mineral Wealth
Nairobi, 21 October 2026
African nations risk losing billions from the critical minerals boom without reliable power. KPMG warns that local energy capacity is essential to process resources and capture economic value.
The Power Deficit Threatening Africa’s Mineral Advantage
Speaking in Nairobi on 21 October 2026, Frank Blackmore, lead economist at KPMG South Africa, warned that African nations risk being sidelined in the global critical minerals boom unless they rapidly resolve severe power shortages and build local beneficiation capacity [1]. The global energy transition, electric vehicle production, and expanding artificial intelligence applications have driven up global demand for critical minerals [1]. However, without reliable electricity grids and regional infrastructure cooperation, the continent will remain stuck in a historic cycle of exporting raw, unrefined resources while forfeiting high-value downstream economic benefits [1].
Quantifying the Staggering Opportunity and Economic Gap
Africa holds approximately 30% of the world’s critical mineral deposits, including roughly 55% of global cobalt reserves, 80% of platinum, 62% of chromium, 38% of manganese reserves, and 25% of natural graphite [4][5]. The economic potential of processing these resources locally is immense: the African Development Bank estimates that domestic critical-mineral processing could generate $32 billion in additional annual exports, add $24 billion to regional GDP, and create 2.3 million jobs [2]. However, the continent captures a negligible share of this value due to severe structural deficits [4]. Approximately 600 million people in sub-Saharan Africa lack electricity access, whilst the region’s mining sector faces an annual infrastructure financing gap between $130 billion and $170 billion [2][5].
AI, Data Infrastructure, and the Staged Industrialisation Strategy
The infrastructure bottleneck extends beyond physical mining into the digital economy [2]. As Blackmore noted on 20 October 2026, artificial intelligence and data centres represent a critical electricity story, with McKinsey projecting African data-centre investment requirements of $10 billion to $20 billion by 2030 to expand capacity from 0.4 gigawatts to between 1.5 and 2.2 gigawatts [2]. To capture this growth, Blackmore recommends a staged industrialisation strategy: first, increase grid electricity capacity; second, identify and process minerals requiring the least power; and third, expand cross-border transport infrastructure like railways and ports [1]. This approach complements broader policy pushes, such as Ghana’s revised Minerals and Mining Policy announced on 19 October 2026, and the World Bank’s August 2026 recommendations for deeper market integration under the African Continental Free Trade Area [1][3].