2027 Agenda

Putting government industrial ambition into direct dialogue with the infrastructure and investment realities required to deliver it, the discussion will first identify where mineral resources and anchor projects can provide the foundations for wider industrial ecosystems, and the infrastructure, policy choices and partnerships required to build around them. Private-sector challengers spanning mining, processing, energy, infrastructure and capital will then test those propositions against the realities of power availability, infrastructure capacity, investment and global competitiveness.

From Morocco’s integrated phosphate ecosystem to Guinea’s alumina ambitions and South Africa’s manganese and steel-linked industries, different models of mineral-led industrialisation are emerging. Yet successful projects do not automatically become successful industrial ecosystems.

The African Proposition

• Can one flagship project genuinely catalyse an ecosystem, or do governments need to deliberately build around it?

The market Test

• Are Africa’s mining and industrial ambitions moving faster than its power systems can support them?