Stakeholders across government, development institutions, the private sector and civil society on Wednesday called for a fundamental shift in Nigeria’s approach to its critical minerals, insisting that the country must use its vast resource endowment to drive green industrialisation rather than repeat the historic model of exporting raw materials and importing finished products.
Speaking at a high-level stakeholder convening on: “Advancing Nigeria’s Green Industrialisation Through Critical Minerals,” the speakers harped on the need to domestic processing, beneficiation, manufacturing, skills development and stronger environmental and community safeguards.
The meeting which took place in Abuja was convened by the National Council for Climate Change (NCCC) and was backed by the Africa Policy Research Institute (APRI), and the Ford Foundation.
At the event, the Minister of Environment, Balarabe Lawal, represented by the Director of Climate Change Department, Federal Ministry of Environment, Dr Iniobong Abiola-Awe, said Nigeria’s pursuit of green industrialisation must not become a justification for environmental degradation.
He argued that critical minerals were increasingly becoming strategic assets, but warned that the development of the sector must be environmentally responsible, economically transformative, socially inclusive and nationally beneficial.
Lawal stressed that economic development and environmental protection must advance together, arguing that responsible investment in the sector should contribute not only capital, but technology, skills, innovation, local value addition and high environmental and social standards.
The minister noted that poorly planned or inadequately regulated mining could create significant pressure on land, water resources, biodiversity and ecosystems.
The environment ministry, he said, would continue to insist on strong environmental governance, compliance, rehabilitation, mine closure and restoration as critical minerals development expanded.
He added that environmental and social impact assessments should not be regarded merely as regulatory requirements, but as planning tools capable of helping governments and investors identify risks, avoid unnecessary impacts and improve project designs.
For her part, the Director General of the NCCC, Dr Tenioye Majekodunmi, said Nigeria must be clear about where the processing, manufacturing, factories, jobs and wealth associated with the emerging green economy would be located. “We cannot repeat the old economic model in a new green economy,” she said.
Majekodunmi argued that merely changing Nigeria’s major export commodity from crude oil to critical minerals without changing the underlying economic structure would not amount to industrialisation.
She said Nigeria’s objective should be to capture more of the value chain domestically through processing, refining, manufacturing, battery assembly, technology, skills, logistics and greater participation by Nigerian businesses.
She identified four priorities, beginning with a deliberate shift from extraction to value addition.
The NCCC boss also said Nigeria’s critical minerals must genuinely be produced in a manner consistent with green and sustainable principles, warning that the country could face increasing scrutiny over the carbon footprint, traceability and environmental integrity of its mineral supply chains.
Majekodunmi further stressed the need to connect climate ambition to capital, arguing that the government alone could not finance processing plants, clean energy infrastructure and manufacturing facilities.
“Capital follows certainty,” she said, noting that policy certainty, regulatory coordination and an enabling investment environment would be crucial to attracting private financing.
She also maintained that communities must experience tangible benefits from Nigeria’s green industrial transition through jobs, improved businesses, reliable power, infrastructure and rising incomes.
In her intervention, the Senior Adviser on Mining and Policy to Dele Alake, the Minister of Solid Minerals Development, Amira Waziri, who spoke during a panel, said Nigeria must stop treating its critical minerals simply as commodities for export and begin to regard them as strategic national assets.
Waziri stressed that countries seeking Nigeria’s minerals were pursuing their own strategic interests and that Nigeria must therefore negotiate agreements that went beyond the amount of capital invested.
She said the country should increasingly ask what technologies would be transferred, what processing capacity would be established locally, what infrastructure would be developed and what skills and technical capabilities Nigerians would acquire.
According to her, the policy direction of the ministry remained focused on moving away from an extract-and-export model towards domestic value addition.
However, Waziri said attracting the right investments would also require Nigeria to improve its own investment fundamentals through better geological information, bankable projects, predictable regulations, security of tenure, competitive infrastructure, a skilled workforce and a clearer pipeline of investable mineral assets.
She added that Nigeria’s objective should be mutually beneficial partnerships in which investors gained commercially viable access to resources while the country built domestic industrial capacity and developed its workforce.
Also speaking, the Executive Director of APRI, Dr Olumide Abimbola, said the global energy and digital transitions, combined with geopolitical concerns over supply-chain security, had intensified international competition for minerals such as lithium, copper, cobalt, nickel, graphite and rare earth elements.
He said APRI’s research mapping Africa’s green mineral partnerships had identified nearly 100 agreements involving African countries and international partners, most of which had been signed within the last decade.
Abimbola said the growing international competition for Africa’s minerals raised fundamental questions about what the development meant for Nigeria and whether the country could use its resources to support industrialisation, technological development, decent jobs and domestic businesses.
“We could move from exporting crude oil to exporting raw minerals, while most of the processing, technology, manufacturing and economic value continue to be created elsewhere. That cannot be our ambition,” he stated.
He explained that APRI’s work in Nigeria had involved engagements with artisanal and small-scale miners, mining companies, professional associations, researchers, civil society organisations, government institutions and communities.
The institute, he said, had also undertaken field engagements across five mineral-rich states and examined constraints ranging from geological information and exploration finance to institutional capacity, investment conditions and domestic processing.
Abimbola said Nigeria’s critical minerals strategy must address three broad areas, including the country’s place in a changing global order, the development of its domestic minerals ecosystem and the protection of environmental and community rights.
He stressed that mining communities should not bear the environmental and social costs of mineral development while the economic value was created elsewhere.
Regional Director, Ford Foundation, Dr Chichi Aniagolu-Okoye, in her comments, said Nigeria’s vision for its critical minerals must go beyond supplying raw materials to the global green economy.
Aniagolu-Okoye noted that Nigeria possessed minerals required for the global energy transition, including lithium, copper, magnesium and bauxite, but stressed that the country must break what she described as the historic cycle of raw extraction.
According to her, the policy direction should prioritise domestic value addition, with processing, beneficiation and manufacturing taking place within Nigeria.
She said the development of local processing facilities, improved geological exploration, technology deployment and enforcement of local content requirements could help Nigeria build an industrial ecosystem capable of generating high-skilled employment and retaining greater economic value within the country.
Aniagolu-Okoye added that collaboration among government institutions, investors, industry, development partners, civil society and research organisations would be crucial to developing practical policies capable of transforming Nigeria’s mineral endowment into sustainable prosperity.
Similarly, a representative of the Executive Secretary of the Solid Minerals Development Fund (SMDF), Abdulmajeed Oyeyemi, said Nigeria’s opportunity was not merely about the resources beneath its soil, but what the country could build with them.
He argued that resource-rich countries had historically occupied the lowest end of global value chains through extraction, while the greater economic benefits from processing, manufacturing and technological applications were captured elsewhere.
Oyeyemi said Nigeria should seek to become a competitive participant in the value chains supported by critical minerals rather than simply becoming a reliable supplier of raw materials.
He also highlighted the geopolitical importance of critical minerals as countries and industries increasingly sought secure and diversified sources of supply.
However, he maintained that Nigeria would need to determine where it had genuine comparative advantage, identify the segments of the value chain it could realistically capture and deliberately develop the capabilities required to compete.
According to him, the country must create genuinely investable opportunities supported by credible geological information, strong institutions, predictable policies, transparent processes, infrastructure and bankable projects.
On the energy side, the Managing Director of the Rural Electrification Agency (REA), Abba Aliyu, represented by his Special Adviser, Jafar Dikko, said Nigeria’s rapidly expanding renewable energy programmes could provide an anchor for domestic manufacturing and localisation across the clean energy value chain.
Aliyu noted that much of the equipment deployed in Nigeria’s renewable energy programmes, including solar panels, batteries, converters and meters, continued to be imported.
He argued that Nigeria’s growing domestic demand for renewable energy equipment should be treated not merely as a procurement requirement, but as an industrial asset capable of supporting local manufacturing, assembly, technology transfer and skills development.
“The battery is where a mineral becomes a machine. It is the step where the value sits,” he said. He added that Nigeria’s lithium and other strategic minerals should not leave the country as raw ore only to return as expensive finished batteries.
According to him, beneficiation, battery manufacturing, recycling and the development of associated skills should increasingly take place within Nigeria to reduce import dependence and foreign exchange exposure, create skilled employment and strengthen energy security.
Emmanuel Addeh
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